A New Federal Law

The William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) of 2008 significantly enhances the tools available to prosecute traffickers and increases protection and services for U.S. citizen and foreign national victims in the U.S. Other highlights of the bill include provisions that:

* strengthen the State Department's rating system of other countries' anti-trafficking efforts, which is used as a diplomatic tool to urge those governments to improve their anti-trafficking policy
* strengthen the role of the State Department's Trafficking in Persons Office in both domestic and foreign policy
* strengthen U.S. policy toward countries that use children in armed groups
* improve employment-based visa processing to prevent trafficking of migrant workers to the United States
* create new protections for unaccompanied foreign national children arriving in the United States
* improve the T-visa (special visa for trafficking victims in the United States) to protect victims and their family members
* authorize new studies, reports, and data collection mechanisms to improve our understanding of human trafficking globally and in the U.S.

To read the full bill on The Library of Congress website, search for bill number HR 7311.