Today, a bill supported by Congresswoman Kyrsten Sinema (AZ-09) to prevent human trafficking was signed into law by the president. The bill empowers local law enforcement to bring websites that facilitate or promote sex trafficking to justice, striking at the heart of a growing illegal industry that scars thousands of young lives in Arizona and across the country.

“Families and communities across Arizona are torn apart by human trafficking, and this new law helps them fight back,” said Sinema. “These new tools for law enforcement will help bring sex traffickers to justice, and I’m proud to have worked across the aisle to get them signed into law. I’ll continue to work with any party toward commonsense solutions that keep Arizona families safe and help bring an end to the international human trafficking crisis.”

Dr. Dominique Roe-Sepowitz, Director of Arizona State University’s Office of Sex Trafficking Intervention Research praised Sinema’s efforts to pass the bill. “I applaud Congresswoman Sinema’s long history fighting human trafficking,” said Roe-Sepkowitz. “Her work to make this bill into law will help prosecutors put these criminals behind bars and protect trafficking victims. As someone who has studied sex trafficking and worked with hundreds of victims who have been trafficked online, I know this new law will help keep Arizona families safe.”

The Sinema-cosponsored bill allows prosecutors to hold operators of websites criminally liable if they knowingly promote human trafficking. Some web platforms have exploited that loophole to evade responsibility for content uploaded by their users, even if that content promotes sexual exploitation and trafficking.

Earlier this year, the House passed a bill cosponsored by Sinema that would help save children's lives in tribal communities. The bill, the Ashlynne Mike AMBER Alert in Indian Country Act, expands the Amber Alert program on Native American reservations so that communities can respond more quickly to reports of missing children.  

Sinema has spent her entire career standing up for victims of human trafficking and domestic abuse. In her first job – working at a domestic violence shelter – she cared for women and girls who had survived rape and domestic violence. Sinema worked with children in the Sunnyslope community for almost a decade and drew on this experience in the state legislature, where she worked across the aisle to pass reforms that increased penalties for human traffickers.

In the House, Sinema has been a leader in the fight against sex trafficking. In 2014, she helped pass comprehensive legislation to expand the resources available to trafficking victims and improve government agencies' response to the problem. Sinema also cosponsored legislation to criminalize the advertisement of innocent victims being forced into sex trafficking. That bill, the SAVE Act, was signed into law in 2015.

Last year, the Congresswoman co-sponsored the TARGET Act, which improves State Department efforts to counter human trafficking and was signed into law in March.  Sinema continues to work towards passage of the Human Trafficking Prioritization Act, of which she is a cosponsor. The bill ensures that the State Department places a high priority on its work to fight human trafficking.

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