Human Trafficking Victims Protection Act

Human trafficking is defined as the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision or obtaining of a person for labor or services, through the use of force, fraud or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage or slavery.1 The 3 most common types of human trafficking are sex trafficking, forced labor, and debt bondage. According to the US Department of State, forced labor is the biggest type of trafficking in the world. Debt bondage is another form of human trafficking. This entails that an individual is forced into labor to pay off a debt they have. Sex trafficking almost always involves the forced prostitution of women, although it does fall upon men and often children as well. Women and girls
Laws and acts have been passed in the attempt of preventing all forms of human trafficking into the US. The Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of 2000 is the beginning of human trafficking legislation passed- this established methods of prosecuting traffickers, preventing human trafficking, and protecting victims and survivors of trafficking.11 This act provides punishments for those who traffic people into the US and works to prevent trafficking by publishing a Trafficking In Persons (TIP) report each year. The act also assists victims of trafficking in the process of becoming citizens of the United States by allowing family members to join the victim in the US and, after three years, allowing the victims, along with their family, to become permanent residents of the US. Many acts followed this one which all added on to this original policy. These acts included The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2003, The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2005, The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2008, and The Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of
This law is called “Law to Prevent and Punish Trafficking in Persons” (roughly translated). This law is aimed at the prevention and punishment of trafficking and the protection of victims and potential victims. This applies to non-Mexican citizens as well as citizens.12 However, prostitution essentially remains completely legal in Mexico, since commercial sex is not directly and explicitly forbidden by law. Despite the above-noted restrictions, pimping and child exploitation are still practiced widely without arrest or prosecution. What is even more appalling is the fact that all this goes on with the knowledge and/or the collaboration of corrupted law enforcement officials within Mexico