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YLS Special Issue
l
PROTECTING OUR CHILDREN
CBA RECORD
35
An “Alternative” Report to the UN
Last fall, the Center for the Human Rights
of Children at Loyola University Chicago,
in collaboration with the Young Center
for Immigrant Children’s Rights at the
University of Chicago, along with over 50
organizations and experts from around the
country submitted our “alternative” report
to the United Nations Committee on the
Rights of the Child (CRC), with a focus
on the sale of children for the purpose
of forced labor as defined under Articles
2-3 of the OPSC. Our recommendations
addressed three larger thematic areas in
which the US government could improve
its efforts to combat human trafficking,
emphasizing issues facing children who
are victims of labor trafficking. Our report
acknowledged that victims of both labor
and sexual trafficking face similar chal-
lenges and emphasizes the importance of
advancing efforts to address both labor and
sexual exploitation of all children equally,
regardless of nationality or legal status.
First, we emphasized that while there has
been much progress since the last reporting
period, child labor trafficking continues to
remain largely hidden, unidentified, and
misidentified. Documented cases in the
United States include children working
as domestic servants, in restaurants, in
agriculture, in factories, peddling on the
streets, and in forced criminality. Yet many
first responders make little to no effort to
identify child labor trafficking. Current
data collection, research, training, and
policy efforts focus overwhelmingly on
child sex trafficking.
For example, the Preventing Sex Traf-
ficking and Protecting Families Act,
mandates that child welfare professionals
create screening instruments, data collec-
tion tools, and services for victims. This
is a seminal piece of legislation that has
tremendous impact on child protection
systems working with at-risk and vulner-
able youth in every state, but it focuses
exclusively
on child sex trafficking. Simi-
larly, many states, including Illinois have
passed important Safe Harbor laws that
decriminalize and protect children who
are being commercially sexually exploited.
While these laws advance the rights of child
sex trafficking victims and improve oppor-
tunities to identify sex trafficked children,
they ignore children who are trafficked for
labor. This exclusion of child labor traffick-
ing creates a false hierarchy of crimes and
victims contrary to the principles of the
OPSC and TVPA, which seek to combat
all forms of human trafficking.
Second, our alternative report identified
the need for greater protections for vulner-
able youth populations to human traffick-
ing. For example, unaccompanied and
separated migrant children are extremely
vulnerable to trafficking and exploitation.
Often smuggling arrangements turn into
trafficking arrangements, with the burden
of paying a large debt incurred for the
transport of the child to the US falling on
the child. The US government projects
record number of children will arrive this
fiscal year–more than 70,000, which is
an increase of over 60% from the surge
in 2014. Under the current legal system,
unaccompanied immigrant children have
the burden of establishing their eligibil-
ity for relief from deportation—the US
immigration system for children is not
protection based (in contrast to domestic
child welfare systems for children).
Vulnerable Groups
Groups vulnerable to child trafficking
including “system-involved” youth, home-
less and runaway youth, LGBTQ youth,
and children engaged in forced criminality.
Recent research indicates that trafficked
children suffer higher incidents of neglect
and of physical and sexual abuse.
In one study, at least one-third of young
people receiving services as trafficking vic-
tims had been involved in the child welfare
system and nearly two-thirds of one NGO’s
clients had been involved in the juvenile
justice system.
Homeless youth are often targeted by
labor traffickers because they lack access to
shelter, food, and personal connections. A
survey conducted by the National Network
for Youth in 2013 found that runaway and
homeless youth had been targeted by door-
to-door trafficking sales rings. These youth
were lured by the promise of housing,
employment, and food but found them-
selves living in overcrowded motel rooms
with other labor-trafficked youth, receiving
little or no pay, and given unreasonable
sales quotas. National Network for Youth,
Human trafficking and the runaway and
homeless youth population (2014), avail-
able at:
http://bit.ly/1KpKC5O.Research
shows that LGBTQ youth are at higher
risk of both homelessness and exploitation,
including both sex and labor trafficking.
The Need for Attorneys
Our final overarching recommendation
was the need to provide all vulnerable
children legal representation and advocacy
to ensure their rights are protected.
For unaccompanied, migrant children,
there are no special courts for children
in immigration proceedings, no special
judges, and no statutory best interest stan-
dard for foreign national children who are
victims of child trafficking. While there
have been modest improvements to pro-
vide unaccompanied children attorneys,
children continue to appear in adversarial
immigration proceedings, alone, without
legal representation. For children who are
not represented by counsel, less than 20%
receive some form of legal protection. This
is compared to cases of children who are
represented, in which over 70% receive
protection. Unaccompanied children
should be provided attorneys and indepen-
dent child advocates to ensure their rights
are being protected, and that they have a
better chance of being identified as a crime
victim under the OPSC and TVPA.
Under federal anti-trafficking laws and
state Safe Harbor statutes, more children
are being identified as victims. This is a
positive step forward. This also means that
more children are not just being identified
as victims, but are also serving as
victim-
witnesses
in legal proceedings against their
accused perpetrators. As victim-witnesses,
To see a full text of our alternative report and
its ten recommendations, visit http://bit.
ly/2k15qZz.