Eradicating Child Sex Trafficking in America

As our team stood in the US Capitol, we stood on ground where history is made. Our goal is to spark change in our nation by igniting a fire in each of you to be part of history--to be part of ending child sex trafficking.

For years, efforts have been made to raise awareness of sex trafficking, to make laws to prevent it, and to rescue those enslaved, but the story cannot end at rescue.

Often we get the question, why a safe house or what is a safe house. A Safe House is not a homeless shelter, domestic violence shelter, or orphanage. A safe house is not just a shelter. It is a home where victims are transformed into survivors through therapies, medical care, education, and skill training. A safe house network is everything from emergency housing to long-term restorative housing to transitional opportunities. It is creating a continuum of care that empowers a survivors path to freedom.

Safe Houses are places where those who have been treated as a commodity and nothing more can start rebuilding their identity and confidence. Without restorative care, the majority of victims will never testify against their trafficker. We cannot eradicate this epidemic without providing robust treatment to those who have been victims.

In 2019, Safe House Project launched safe houses in 6 states, but these represent the beginning of a full safe house network. In 2020, we are mentoring and launching safe houses in an additional 10 states. But, our goal is to see a full safe house network representing the full continuum of care in every state by 2025.

While restoration is necessary for those who have been victimized to truly eradicate this issue it needs to be prevented by protecting our children and eliminating the demand.

Safe House Project is advancing education in communities across America to prevent, spot, and report trafficking. In 2019, we trained more than 10,000 people. In 2020, we will train over 25,000 people in person.

You can help progress training by signing your support for the two bills provided in your program and returning them to our registration desk for us to deliver to your respective representative. One of these bills focuses on ensuring proper training for law enforcement to identify survivors, and the second requires sex trafficking education in schools across America to protect our children. Through prevention and treatment, Safe House Project is making sure that we are tackling the problem from both sides.

As we stand on the precipice of the next decade, Safe House Project is leading the nation in unifying communities to eradicate child sex trafficking in America by 2030. Safe House Project knows that in order to achieve this vision it will require a safe house network in every state, it will require preventative education in our communities, it will require corporations engaging to disrupt trafficking and invest in the fight, it will require laws to be passed that support survivor care, it will require harsher penalties for traffickers and buyers, it will require eliminating the demand, but when each person engages change is possible. When our nation unites behind protecting our children's innocence and serving those who have already been victimized child sex trafficking becomes a solvable issue.