Human Trafficking In The United States

A country that is a focus for the recruitment of victims is not always a country that is a focus for the placement of victims. Basing the ranks of countries off the number of citizens reported missing, top-ranked countries to recruit victims are Belarus, The Republic of Moldova, The Russia Federation, Ukraine, Bulgaria, China, Thailand, and Nigeria. As one may observe, many of these countries are second and third world countries. Looking at the number of victims recovered, top-ranked countries to place victims are most commonly first and second world countries. These countries include Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Turkey, and the United States. The United States is involved on both sides of human trafficking.
There are

In 2000, the United States congress passed a bill called “The Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act” or TVPA. The purpose of this law was to help victims of human trafficking, give stricter punishment to traffickers, and help increase efforts in other countries to stop human trafficking. In an effort to do this, the United States created a “T-Visa.” A T-Visa is given to a human trafficking victim when they are recused on United States soil but are not originally from the United States. The T-Visa then allows him/her to stay for up to three years, but only if he/she promises to assist in the prosecution of their trafficker. Since 2003, over 50,000 T-Visas have been issued. Only 6,206 of these T-Visas have been issued to victims of human trafficking and/or their families (“Human Issues”). Additionally, the TVPA has the authority to place sanctions on every country throughout the world. According to Meriam-Webster, sanctions are “an action that is taken or an order that is given to force a country to obey international laws by limiting or stopping trade with that country, by not allowing economic aid for that country, etc.” The government decides this by placing every country into a given tier, based on their efforts in the prosecution of human traffickers. Tier one is for countries that comply with all rules of the TVPA, tier two is meant for countries who are partially complying with the TVPA rules, and tier three is for countries who do not comply at all with TVPA rules. Sanctions are most often placed on countries in tier one and tier two in an effort to intimidate them to start complying and making significant efforts (‘Tier”). But the government is not the only men and women making an effort to stop human trafficking. Private organizations, such as Operation Underground Railroad or O.U.R., are a very large part in the global fight as well. O.U.R. is an