Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorizatoin Act of 2005

Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I rise today to speak about the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act approved by the House on Thursday, December 15. This legislation increases the Government's ability to combat human trafficking and provides greater protective measures for victims of this deplorable crime. I thank my colleagues in the House for working on this legislation in an expedited fashion, and for their leadership in responding to these challenges.

The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act includes language from the End Demand for Sex Trafficking Act of 2005, a bill that I introduced earlier this year. That bill is important because it expresses Congress' commitment to reduce U.S. domestic demand for sex trafficking--which disproportionately victimizes women and children. It incorporates more stringent provisions to penalize human traffickers, and it enhances protective measures for the victims of trafficking crimes.

This is accomplished by establishing Federal grants which could be used to focus on prosecution efforts. In addition, it strengthens and clarifies Federal criminal law, making it easier to prosecute those who transport persons who are then used for prostitution across State lines. And it includes an important oversight element: the Attorney General will be required to release an annual report on best practices for reducing the demand for unlawful commercial sex.

The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution states: ``Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude ..... shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.'' This provision is unique to our Constitution. Many constitutional amendments protect individual rights against actions by Federal, State, and local governments. But the Thirteenth Amendment is unique because it provides that slavery and involuntary servitude cannot exist--neither in public nor private spheres.

Yet, even to this day, men, women, and children are trafficked into the United States and coerced into lives ravaged by forced labor and sexual slavery.

I join the administration in commending the House International Relations and Judiciary Committees who joined me to address this important issue. Indeed, this bill lays out the terrible facts: as many as 800,000 human beings are literally bought and sold worldwide into some form of slavery or involuntary servitude--approximately 80 percent are women and girls and up to 50 percent are children. Roughly 16,000 of those human beings are brought into the United States each year, coerced into lives of forced labor or sexual servitude which, of course, is slavery.

The fact is the current administration has responded to the call by dramatically increasing efforts devoted to providing substantially more resources to combat human trafficking. This has been done principally under the auspices of the civil rights division at the Justice Department. The Department has initiated more than three times the number of trafficking investigations, filed almost four times as many of these cases. and doubled the number of defendants convicted for these heinous crimes than in the prior 4-year period.

Mr. President, I am pleased this important piece of legislation has passed, and look forward to working with my colleagues on this very important issue in the future.

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