Issue Position: Human Trafficking

Issue Position

Senator Ayotte's Efforts to Fight Human Trafficking:

 Protecting and Empowering Trafficking Victims: Senator Ayotte is a cosponsor of the Stop Exploitation Through Trafficking Act (S. 1733), a bipartisan bill that creates a national safe harbor law, increases damages for victims in civil suits, strengthens the Sex Offender Registry, puts forth clear eligibility criteria for Job Corps, encourages better data-sharing among law enforcement, creates a National Strategy to Combat Human Trafficking, requires better data on restitution orders collected, and codifies the National Human Trafficking Hotline.

 Providing Resources to Fight Trafficking: Senator Ayotte supports robust and strong funding for agencies to fight human trafficking. In addition, Senator Ayotte cosponsored the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2011, which was later incorporated into the Violence Against Women Act (Public Law 113-4).

 Making Combatting Trafficking a Priority at the State Department: Senator Ayotte is a cosponsor of S. 1249, a bipartisan bill that would elevate the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking to a full bureau within the State Department. The permanence and additional personnel that would follow this elevation - including the appointment of an Assistant Secretary of State - would afford greater independence to the tier placement process.

 Enabling developing countries to fight sex crimes: Senator Ayotte joined a bipartisan group of Senators to urge Secretary Kerry to give greater attention to child sexual assault and capacity for the Guatemalan police when making decisions regarding U.S. assistance to Guatemala. A 2012 report by Doctors Without Borders found that a quarter of all adolescent women and girls in Guatemala reported they had been a victim of sexual violence within the past year.

 Focusing resources on countries with the will and capacity to lead: Senator Ayotte has joined a bipartisan group of Senators to urge the State Department to designate Ghana and the Philippines as "focus countries" for child slavery eradication. Ghana and the Philippines both have a significant problem with child trafficking (labor trafficking in Ghana and sex trafficking in the Philippines), but both countries also possess and display the political will to confront it and are in a good position to serve as anti-trafficking models of success to be implemented in other countries in the future.

 "Bring Our Girls Home": Senator Ayotte called on President Obama to impose severe sanctions and restrictions on the terrorist group Boko Haram, which in May 2014 claimed responsibility for the abduction in Nigeria of more than 200 girls. Senator Ayotte joined all of her female Senate colleagues to urge the administration to pursue international sanctions on Boko Haram by seeking its addition to the United Nations Security Council's al-Qa'ida Sanctions List. Senator Ayotte joined in introducing the Boko Haram Terrorist Designation Act of 2013 (S. 198) over a year before the kidnappings.

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