Anti-Human Trafficking Bill ‘A Lifeline’ To Victims

In remarks on the Senate floor yesterday, I thanked victim advocacy groups and his Senate colleagues for working together to end the impasse over the Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act.

I have been focused like a laser for some time now on justice for the victims of human trafficking, and I can't think of a more compelling need for the United States Senate than to try to offer a lifeline to these victims of human trafficking, and that's what this legislation is designed to do.

We have found a way now on a bipartisan basis to move this legislation forward so we can offer a hand to rescue these victims of human trafficking. We can give them an opportunity to heal, and we can provide them some hope for a better future.

One of the problems with the way we used to treat victims of human trafficking is we treated them like the criminal. That is beginning to change.

All this legislation is designed to do is to help the victims of human trafficking get rescued and then begin to heal and to get on with their lives. It's designed to provide much-needed resources for victims of human trafficking, plain and simple.

This body's consideration of this bill has proven that compromise and bipartisanship need not be relics of the past in today's Washington, but they are very much alive and well, particularly when the need is so very great as it is in this area.

I know it's a little premature, but we would have not gotten this far if it weren’t for the help of organizations like Rights4Girls, Shared Hope International, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, the End Child Prostitution and Trafficking Organization, [and] the National Association to Protect Children.

And, indeed, today I hope and believe that we will get this done.