Political Quotes

“Too often we hear about human trafficking and sex slavery. It is often dismissed as a crime that only happens ``over there''--overseas or in a foreign country. The Global Slavery Index estimated that nearly 46 million people across 167 countries were victims of human trafficking in 2016. This problem is very real. But here at home, it is also a problem, where we have children and young people who are forced or coerced into sex work and hard labor in our communities all across the country. As America's gateway to Asia, my home State of Hawaii sees an unprecedented number of people taken from their homes to be exploited here on our shores. In 2010, the FBI freed 400 Thai nationals from a Hawaii farm, the largest human trafficking case in our modern history. In Hawaii, I know personally of girls as young as 11 and 13 years old who were recruited from schools, malls, beaches, and other places, and exploited by traffickers. While every State, including Hawaii, has passed legislation to ban trafficking and classify it as a felony, clearly stronger, further action is needed to combat this modern, international slave trade.…”