[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 1]
[House]
[Pages 1168-1170]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                    HUMAN TRAFFICKING PREVENTION ACT

  Mr. ROYCE. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill 
(H.R. 357) to amend the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 to 
expand the training for Federal Government personnel relating to 
trafficking in persons, and for other purposes.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The text of the bill is as follows:

                                H.R. 357

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Human Trafficking Prevention 
     Act''.

     SEC. 2. EXPANDED TRAINING RELATING TO TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS.

       Section 105(c)(4) of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act 
     of 2000 (22 U.S.C. 7105(c)(4)) is amended--
       (1) by inserting ``, including members of the Service (as 
     such term is defined in section 103 of the Foreign Service 
     Act of 1980 (22 U.S.C. 3903))'' after ``Department of 
     State''; and
       (2) by adding at the end the following: ``Training under 
     this paragraph shall include, at a minimum, the following:
       ``(A) A distance learning course on trafficking-in-persons 
     issues and the Department of State's obligations under this 
     Act, targeted for embassy reporting officers, regional 
     bureaus' trafficking-in-persons coordinators, and their 
     superiors.
       ``(B) Specific trafficking-in-persons briefings for all 
     ambassadors and deputy chiefs of mission before such 
     individuals depart for their posts.
       ``(C) At least annual reminders to all such personnel, 
     including appropriate personnel from other Federal 
     departments and agencies, at each diplomatic or consular post 
     of the Department of State located outside the United States 
     of key problems, threats, methods, and warning signs of 
     trafficking in persons specific to the country or 
     jurisdiction in which each such post is located, and 
     appropriate procedures to report information that any such 
     personnel may acquire about possible cases of trafficking in 
     persons.''.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
California (Mr. Royce) and the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. 
Cicilline) each will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from California.


                             General Leave

  Mr. ROYCE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may 
have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and 
include extraneous material in the Record.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from California?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. ROYCE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise today as a committed participant in this body's 
decade-and-a-half-long fight against human trafficking since the 
passage of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000. Although we 
have made some progress and raised global awareness on this issue, 
there are still today somewhere around 20 million people around the 
world who remain subject to the horrors of this modern day slavery, 
either through trafficking for exploitation for work or child sex 
trafficking. Most of these victims are women, and many, as you know, 
Mr. Speaker, are children.
  Given the high stakes, U.S. officials working overseas must be able 
to recognize the signs, the telltale signs, of this terrible crime. If 
they do not know which groups are most vulnerable, or what activities 
should raise their suspicions, then successful action is very unlikely.
  Though current law requires that State Department personnel be 
trained to identify trafficking victims, it does not prescribe how they 
should be trained. This bill does. The Human Trafficking Prevention Act 
would specify minimum training requirements for the Department of 
State. These would include a training course for Department personnel 
who deal with trafficking issues, in addition to trafficking briefings 
for all of our Ambassadors and all of our deputy chiefs of mission 
before they depart for their posts. It also ensures that U.S. officials 
stationed overseas get annual updates on trafficking-related 
developments related to the countries where they are working.
  We have done a lot to move legislation to force other countries to 
adopt legislation. But our Ambassadors overseas and their deputies 
overseas need this education.
  While the State Department currently appears to be meeting many of 
the standards, we all know that practices can change, and by specifying 
reasonable minimal requirements for such training, this bill 
strengthens existing law at no additional cost to our taxpayers.
  I want to recognize the gentleman from New York (Mr. Sean Patrick 
Maloney), who authored this measure, which passed as H.R. 4449 during 
the last Congress, and I want to thank him for reintroducing the bill 
that is before us today.
  While we are discussing improvements to the anti-trafficking 
practices of our foreign affairs agencies, I also want to invite my 
colleagues to cosponsor H.R. 400, the bipartisan Trafficking Prevention 
in Foreign Affairs Contracting Act, that my ranking member of the 
committee, Eliot Engel, and I recently introduced and which we hope to 
move forward promptly.
  I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. CICILLINE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume, and I rise in strong support of H.R. 357, the Human 
Trafficking Prevention Act.
  Mr. Speaker, I would first like to thank my friend and colleague, the 
distinguished gentleman from New York (Mr. Sean Patrick Maloney), for 
introducing this important piece of legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, human trafficking is modern-day slavery. Its victims are 
robbed of both their freedom and dignity. Human trafficking violates 
the founding principles of the United States--life, liberty, and the 
pursuit of happiness--and humanity's very fundamental principle of 
respect.
  According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, almost 
every nation in the world is affected by trafficking. There are at 
least 152 countries of origin and 124 countries of destination affected 
by human trafficking, totaling over 510 trafficking flows around the 
world.
  Human trafficking victims often pay to be illegally transported into 
various countries, only to find themselves at the mercy of their 
captors, deprived of their freedom. They are forced into various forms 
of servitude to repay their debts. Frighteningly, the U.N. also reports 
that 1 in 3 known victims of human trafficking is a child. In some 
areas of the world, such as Africa and the Middle East, children 
constitute 62 percent of their human trafficking incidents. Women and 
girls account for 70

[[Page 1169]]

percent of trafficking victims worldwide, and men make up over 60 
percent of trafficking incidents for forced labor. Human trafficking 
victimizes people of all ages, genders, and ethnicities.

                              {time}  1615

  Mr. Speaker, I am proud to be a cosponsor of the Human Trafficking 
Prevention Act which is designed to ensure that representatives of our 
government recognize incidents of human trafficking when they see it.
  H.R. 357 would expand Federal training requirements for State 
Department personnel on identifying and preventing human trafficking. 
This training includes specific training in persons, briefings for all 
Ambassadors and deputy chiefs of mission before such individuals depart 
for their post.
  This bill would also require that annual reminders be sent to 
appropriate diplomatic personnel about the key problems, threats, 
methods, and warning signs of trafficking in persons at their 
respective Embassy and consular post.
  Mr. Speaker, this legislation will better prepare our Nation's public 
servants to quickly identify incidents of human trafficking and take 
swift action as they serve abroad. We passed the same bill last year, 
and I urge my colleagues to do so again.
  I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. ROYCE. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time to close.
  Mr. CICILLINE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
New York (Mr. Sean Patrick Maloney), the author of this important bill.
  Mr. SEAN PATRICK MALONEY of New York. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong 
support of my bill, H.R. 357, the Human Trafficking Prevention Act.
  I would like to thank my colleagues Mr. Royce and Mr. Cicilline and 
my cosponsors, and I would like to acknowledge Majority Leader McCarthy 
for his leadership on taking up this legislation at the beginning of 
this new Congress.
  No matter what part of the country you are from, human trafficking is 
an issue that we have to address now because lives are at stake. The 
State Department estimates that millions of children, women, and men 
are trafficked each year and forced into modern-day slavery as part of 
an evil and fast-growing industry.
  We know that the crime of human trafficking is dramatically 
underreported, and most of it happens invisibly; therefore, a critical 
part of the work we are doing today is to bring human trafficking out 
in the open, so we can raise awareness and prevent it from happening to 
more of the world's most vulnerable populations.
  We must also remember that this happens right here in our 
communities, all across our own country. Behind all of these numbers 
and statistics, there are real faces and real stories of women, men, 
and, too often, children--women like Mandy Palmer of western New York 
who 4 years ago met a man named Ryan online. Ryan was not who he 
pretended to be. Ryan turned out to be a human trafficker, a pimp who 
forced Mandy into prostitution and threatened her family.
  New York continues to be one of the top hubs of human trafficking 
where sex trafficking, child labor, and indentured servitude happen all 
too frequently. Just one organization in New York, Safe Horizon, has 
worked with more than 600 victims in recent years.
  In the Hudson Valley, we have seen it in Newburgh, in Poughkeepsie, 
places like Wappingers Falls, places like New Windsor, and even small 
villages like Pound Ridge. Story after story tells us that this 
disgusting, this horrifying practice of modern-day slavery happens 
right here, right in our own neighborhoods, in our own backyards.
  Just 10 days ago, authorities took action against a major sex 
trafficking ring in Albany, New York. Nine women who had traveled here 
from a foreign country were forced into prostitution at four different 
massage parlors.
  In another community in the Hudson Valley, about an hour away from 
New York City, a man tricked teenage girls to travel to the United 
States on tourist visas from countries like Brazil, Hungary, and 
France. He instructed these women to lie to both Immigration and State 
Department officials in order to gain access to our country.
  It is precisely this type of situation that my legislation seeks to 
stop. We must ensure that our men and women on the front lines of our 
borders have the resources and training they need in order to identify 
and stop human trafficking at its source, before these women, children, 
and men enter the United States out of their own culture, away from 
their own language many times, and become isolated and become victims.
  As part of our goal to end human trafficking, we can make sure that 
our Foreign Service officers and other government personnel have the 
tools and training they need to spot and to identify these victims and 
to stop this trafficking across international borders.
  In the past, the State Department estimated that between 14,000 and 
17,000 foreign nationals were trafficked into the United States every 
single year. Although the Federal Government has a zero tolerance 
policy on human trafficking, our Foreign Service officers, who often 
have face-to-face contact with these victims when they are obtaining 
U.S. visas, currently undergo minimal training to define, identify, and 
recognize the indicators of this human trafficking so they can stop it 
at the source.
  My legislation would expand new minimum training procedures for 
Foreign Service officers and other government personnel in order to 
identify and stop this human trafficking before people cross these 
boundaries and end up in our own communities, before it becomes too 
late, when they are here and victimized.
  We know criminals will do just about anything to adapt to our new 
methods and to avoid getting caught, so this bipartisan legislation 
also requires annual updates to keep on top of key problems, threats, 
the new methods, and to identify new warning signs of trafficking.
  I want to thank my colleagues across the aisle because, by working 
together, we have a new opportunity to come together to combat this 
monstrous practice of trafficking in children, women, and men. Victims 
of human trafficking cannot wait another day. Today, we have an 
opportunity to do something together to combat this growing problem.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support my legislation, H.R. 
357, the Human Trafficking Prevention Act.
  Mr. CICILLINE. Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I yield 
back the balance of my time.
  Mr. ROYCE. I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, the fight to end human trafficking has been a priority 
in my tenure as chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee here in the 
House, but I am pleased that the House leadership and my colleagues on 
both sides of the aisle have chosen to make it our focus during this 
early week of the session.
  Our actions today are not a conclusion on this issue. They are an 
opening salvo by the 114th Congress to continue our fight against 
modern slavery. This bill seeks to ensure that U.S. personnel overseas 
are properly equipped to combat the scourge of human trafficking and 
deserves our unanimous support.
  There are other steps which we need to take, frankly, as an 
institution in order to continue to put leverage at the disposal of our 
diplomats and new measures into law to protect the victims of 
trafficking. As we go forward, we will do that.
  I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 357, 
the Human Trafficking Prevention Act by the gentleman from New York, 
Sean Patrick Maloney.
  Mr. Speaker, human trafficking is a global scourge. Time and time 
again, there are missed opportunities to identify and assist victims of 
human trafficking. This may be due to a lack of training to recognize 
signs of trafficking, or perhaps a hesitancy to intrude into the 
``privacy'' of others.
  There are numerous points of contact with the victims of trafficking, 
however, and at each point there are people who can intervene if they 
know how to identify victims of trafficking.
  Traffickers often move their victims to avoid detection. Whether by 
plane, train or bus, they come into contact with flight attendants and 
the like, as well as border officials.

[[Page 1170]]

  In July of 2010, I chaired a conference in Washington, D.C., to bring 
together the relevant U.S. agencies, such as the Customs and Border 
Patrol, various U.S. airlines, and non-governmental organizations to 
focus on interdicting traffickers by training commercial transportation 
employees to recognize the indicators for trafficking. Speakers, 
including Deborah Sigmund, founder of a non-government organization 
called Innocents at Risk, explained how flight attendants were the 
``first line of defense'' in the fight against human trafficking.
  Flight attendants are in the unique position to observe a potential 
trafficking in progress and then call a trafficking hotline or inform 
the pilot to radio ahead so that the proper authorities can intervene.
  Former flight attendant Nancy Rivard, President of Airline 
Ambassadors International, told us how she and other flight attendants 
compared notes one day and were shocked and dismayed at how often they 
had noticed what they suspected was a trafficked woman or child on 
their flight, but had no training or protocol to do something about it. 
Nancy has been doing a great deal about it ever since, training airline 
employees around the United States and world.
  Just last year, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) 
released a similar training initiative, the Blue Lightning program, to 
domestic U.S. airlines--including Delta, JetBlue, Allegiant, and North 
American Airlines. With minimal modifications, the training is also 
easily adaptable to bus drivers and station operators, train 
conductors, trucking associations, and other transportation industry 
professionals.
  In December 2013, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in 
Europe, or OSCE, which comprises 57 countries from Europe and North 
America, endorsed my plan to make anti-trafficking training for airline 
employees, other public and commercial carriers, as well as hotel 
employees, a primary goal in the international strategy to combat human 
trafficking. In an earlier session, the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly 
(OSCEPA) adopted my resolution to implement such training in each 
member country.
  But what about our State Department personnel working overseas? Are 
they properly trained to be able to recognize the signs of this heinous 
crime and violation of fundamental human rights?
  Current law does require that State Department personnel be trained 
to identify trafficking victims, and there are many fine foreign 
service officers tasked with addressing trafficking issues.
  But, it does not prescribe any minimum training requirements. H.R. 
357, the Human Trafficking Prevention Act, would mandate several 
minimum training requirements on this issue within the Department of 
State.
  These would include a training course for Department personnel who 
deal with trafficking issues, in addition to trafficking briefings for 
all Ambassadors and Deputy Chiefs of Mission before they depart for 
their posts. The legislation also requires that annual reminders be 
sent to appropriate personnel on key trafficking issues related to 
their countries of focus.
  By specifying the minimum requirements for such training, this bill 
strengthens the existing law. And notably, it does so at no additional 
cost to taxpayers.
  I want to thank Mr. Maloney for authoring this measure, and adding to 
the body of legislation developed by the House to address this critical 
issue.
  Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Speaker, as a senior member of the Judiciary and 
Homeland Security Committees, I rise in strong support of H.R. 357, the 
``Human Trafficking Prevention Act.''
  Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Chairman Royce and Ranking Member Engel 
for their stewardship in bringing this legislation to the floor and for 
their commitment to expanding the training and capability of federal 
government personnel in detecting and combating human trafficking and 
assisting its victims.
  Throughout my tenure in Congress and a founder and Co-Chair of the 
Congressional Children's Caucus, I have advocated on behalf of victims 
of human trafficking, especially children, who are the most vulnerable 
and innocent victims.
  I am also committed to ensuring that law enforcement agencies have 
the tools, resources, and training necessary to identify, apprehend, 
and prosecute criminals who ruthlessly traffic in people.
  H.R. 357 strengthens the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 
by amending it to require training related to trafficking in persons 
for all State Department personnel. Specifically, the bill requires the 
following:
  1. A distance learning course on trafficking in persons issues and 
the Department of State's obligations under the Act to be completed by 
embassy reporting officers, regional bureaus' trafficking in persons 
coordinators, and their supervisors;
  2. Specific trafficking-in-persons briefings for all ambassadors and 
deputy chiefs of mission before they depart for their posts; and
  3. Annual reminders to all such personnel and other federal personnel 
at each diplomatic or consular post of the Department of State located 
outside the United States of key human trafficking problems, threats, 
methods, and warning signs.
  This legislation does for the State Department what the Jackson Lee 
Amendment to H.R. 4660, ``Commerce, Justice, and Science Appropriations 
Act for 2015,'' approved by the House in the last Congress does for the 
Justice Department.
  That amendment, adopted in May 2014 by the House, provides another 
tool in law enforcement's arsenal to tip the balance in favor of 
victims by ensuring funding for the Attorney General to provide 
training for State and local law enforcement agencies on immigration 
law that may be useful for the investigation and prosecution of crimes 
related to trafficking in persons.
  Mr. Speaker, trafficking in humans, and especially child trafficking, 
has no place in a civilized society and those who engage in this 
illicit trade should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
  To effectively combat human trafficking, we need to provide resources 
and training to government personnel to assist victims and apprehend 
criminals.
  By providing the necessary training and support, we will catch more 
human trafficking criminals and save lives, and prevent many other 
persons, including children, from becoming human trafficking victims.
  I ask my colleagues to join me in supporting H.R. 357, the Human 
Trafficking Prevention Act.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from California (Mr. Royce) that the House suspend the rules 
and pass the bill, H.R. 357.
  The question was taken; and (two-thirds being in the affirmative) the 
rules were suspended and the bill was passed.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

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