1. U.S. Anti-Trafficking Laws
& Carceral Politics
Funding law enforcement, border controls, militarized
humanitarianism, and the monitoring of marginalized
populations by invoking moral panic in legislation.
ByKateZen
ForButterflyMigrantSexWorker
JusticeForum,Toronto5/12/2015

2. New York Human Trafficking
Intervention Courts
¡ In October of 2013, New York launched 11 human trafficking
intervention courts, which are applauded as the model for other
states in the United States.
¡ As an alternative to incarceration, suspected trafficking victims
may receive an adjournment for contemplation of dismissal (ACD)
if they complete 5 – 6 sessions with a social service program, and
are not arrested again within 6 months (adjustable).
¡ Social workers practicing trauma-based psychotherapy are
trained to detect if defendants arrested for prostitution charges
are being trafficked.

3. • Racial targeting in
neighborhoods already
facing discriminatory
policing practices.
• Is it fair to give the
police this much
discretionary power?
Red Umbrella Project: “Criminal, Victim, or Worker?” (2014)
Savior with Handcuffs?

4. ¡ To qualify for protections and benefits, such as the T-visa, arrested
migrant sex workers are pushed to perform for the law and the
social work system, or face detention, deportation, or
incarceration. Authentic voices and experiences are often
simplified and silenced to perform roles for a justice fantasy.
¡ While some benefit from helpful services, others face trouble with
immigration and criminalization. Even with an ACD, defendants
have a criminal record during the period of adjournment, making it
difficult to find housing or other employment during the interim
period. Many arrested are still repeat offenders. The criminal justice
approach can not provide sufficient social support to change
difficult personal circumstances or alter global economic
inequalities/opportunities.
Where are the voices of migrant sex workers? For
whose agenda are they silenced?
Role Play for Justice Fantasy

5. U.S. Anti-Trafficking Laws
¡ Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act (TVPA) of
2000. Reauthorized TVPRA 2003, 2005, 2008.
¡ “Three P’s”––prosecuting traffickers, protecting victims of trafficking,
and preventing the practice of trafficking.
¡ TVPA (2000) defined “severe” sex trafficking as “the recruitment,
harboring, transportation, provision or obtaining of a person for the
purpose of a commercial sex act” where such an act is “induced
by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person induced to
perform such an act has not attained eighteen years of age.”
¡ Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004
¡ U.S. Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Reports. Tiers 1,2,3.
¡ New York State trafficking laws created in 2007, considered
“most comprehensive in the nation,” a model for other states.

6. Post-9/11 Bush Administration
Focus on Prostitution
GirishGulati,“RepresentingTrafficking:
MediaintheUnitedStates,Britain,and
Canada.”(2010)

7. “At the time of writing, the United States is fighting two
concurrent wars: one a declared war in Afghanistan against the
Taliban and the other an illegitimate occupation of Iraq
committed under false pretenses.
In such a context, combating the traffic in women has become
a common denominator political issue, uniting people across
the political and religious spectrum against a seemingly
indisputable act of oppression and exploitation.
It is commonly assumed that only the most callous would
criticize efforts to free the world’s sex slaves from the clutches of
organized and brutal trafficking networks.”
-Gretchen Soderlund, ”Running from the Rescuers: New U.S. Crusades Against
Sex Trafficking and the Rhetoric of Abolition” (2005)
Post-9/11 Bush Administration
Focus on Prostitution

8. Media Frameworks for Trafficking
GirishGulati,“RepresentingTrafficking:
MediaintheUnitedStates,Britain,and
Canada.”(2010)

9. “White Slave Trade”:
The First Moral Panic
(and its collateral damage)
• Rose Livingston, “Angel of
Chinatown” – survivor,
suffragette, self-styled savior
• Suffrage movement and
carceral politics,
xenophobia
• Page Act of 1875 banning
Chinese women from entry
• Chinese Exclusion Act of
1882 – First immigration law
targeting ethnic group.
• Mann Act of 1910, FBI –
Creation of first federal criminal
investigation unit.
Mary Ting Yi Lui, “Saving Young Girls from Chinatown:
white slavery and woman suffrage, 1910-1920.” (2009)

10. Justice for Victims of Trafficking
Act (JVTA) of 2015
¡ Passed through U.S. Senate on April 22, 2015. Now in House of Rep.
¡ Funding for law enforcement. Legitimizing the militarization of
police:
¡ Recruiting wounded and retired veterans into special “Hero Corps” to
rescue child trafficking victims [Sec. 302].
¡ Priority funding for expanding law enforcement units, paying police
salaries and training, and creating new units of judicial prosecutors,
¡ Funding wiretapping initiatives [Sec. 203] and a Cyber Crimes Center
[Sec. 302] specializing in computer forensics and internet surveillance
technologies to be used by the U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement (ICE) in collaboration with the Department of Defense, for
“investigative capacity building” and “data collection.”
¡ Emphasis on child pornography. The Child Exploitation Investigations
Unit funds law enforcement initiatives for cyber-surveillance.

11. First They Came for the…I Did Not
Speak Out – Because I was Not a…
¡ Morality language on sexuality and the global increase of state
surveillance technologies.
¡ UK laws panning pornography coincide with increased government
surveillance of the private lives of its citizens over webcam (Yahoo).
¡ Civil liberties and privacy infringement – sex workers and migrants as the first
ones they come for.
¡ Rights not rescue: global justice framework.
¡ Words of a migrant sex worker in the Butterfly community art project, Toronto:
“Without Asian workers, Europe and North America would not have
reached its level of development. We neither steal nor rob, so don’t
criminalize us for working now in your country. Ask the police to stop
targeting our businesses.”
Who does the global north owe its wealth and development to?
Also: Migrants from non-Asian countries, indigenous people, slavery, indentured
servitude, and low-paid female labor.

12. Rights Not Rescue: A Global Justice
Framework for Migrant Sex Worker Rights
“Since all forms of migration are potentially exploitative, strengthening
labor rights and labor organizations of all migrants – including sex
workers’ organizations – is an antitrafficking and a human rights strategy.
The challenge is to ensure that trafficking is not marginalized from such
forms of empowerment and relegated to a humanitarian ghetto, and
that undocumented migrants are not legally or socially isolated from
state protection and self-defense.
Advocacy groups may be needed to bridge the gap on an interim
basis, but their goal should be to establish a legal framework and social
capital for self-representation by migrant workers in sending and
receiving states.” - Alison Brysk
Rethinking borders, citizenship in a globalized world, the role of
states, markets, and human rights - for economic justice.