From Awareness To Action: The Next Step In The Fight Against Human Trafficking 

Right now, children in the United States are being bought and sold for sex and labor.

While recent years have brought more awareness to this problem, putting an end to modern-day slavery takes action: protecting the vulnerable, prosecuting traffickers, helping survivors rebuild their lives, and coordinating these efforts across every level of government and society.

Fortunately, the Trump administration is advancing survivor-centered policies, strengthening enforcement, and holding traffickers accountable. But while these achievements illuminate the path forward, the fight is far from over.

CPAC’s 4th Annual Summit to Combat Human Trafficking focused on developing the strategic next steps needed to strengthen America’s fight against modern-day slavery. The summit brought together senior Trump administration officials, members of Congress, state leaders, law enforcement, and survivor advocates. The summit reinforced a simple truth: to win the battle against human trafficking, we need sustained partnerships, clear accountability, and measurable results.

Those partnerships are already producing meaningful progress.

Earlier this year, President Donald Trump signed into law the Trafficking Survivors Relief Act — legislation the CPAC Center for Combating Human Trafficking has championed since its inception. For years, survivors who were forced into criminal activity by their traffickers carried criminal records that prevented them from securing housing, employment, and long-term stability even after escaping exploitation.

One survivor, Gina Cavallo, knows that reality firsthand. Although she was selected as a White House Champion of Change for her work helping communities recover after Hurricane Sandy, she was barred from the recognition ceremony after a background check revealed convictions from the period when she was being trafficked.

Those records have since been expunged. In July 2026, she returned to the White House for a human trafficking roundtable.

The Trafficking Survivors Relief Act gives more survivors the opportunity to seek expungement or sentence mitigation while continuing to cooperate with law enforcement. It offers survivors a genuine second chance while strengthening the prosecution of traffickers. The White House has also advanced the TAKE IT DOWN Act, strengthening protections against online sexual exploitation and helping ensure technology cannot be weaponized against children.

Combined with the designation of January as National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, these actions reflect a renewed emphasis on enforcement, prevention, and survivor-centered policy.

That commitment is already producing measurable enforcement results. During the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the Department of Homeland Security and ICE Homeland Security Investigations arrested 905 suspected traffickers and rescued 180 victims, including 30 children. In April, the FBI’s Operation Iron Pursuit located more than 200 child victims and arrested more than 350 alleged predators in a single month. These operations build on a broader increase in trafficking investigations, arrests, and victim recoveries under the Trump administration.

This is a sharp contrast to the Biden administration, which released hundreds of thousands of unaccompanied migrant children into the country with no way to track them. The Department of Health and Human Services later disclosed a backlog of more than 7,300 reports of suspected human trafficking involving migrant children that were never investigated, along with tens of thousands of other concerning leads. Inadequate sponsor vetting placed children with dangerous individuals, contributing to documented cases of sexual abuse, labor exploitation, and other forms of abuse. Fragmented coordination and a failure to prioritize the most vulnerable left too many children at risk.

It’s good that the Trump administration has turned things around. But government cannot win this fight alone.

Lasting progress depends on strong public-private partnerships that bring together federal agencies, state and local governments, nonprofits, faith communities, businesses, survivor leaders, and law enforcement.

That message echoed throughout this year’s summit. Participants agreed that states need greater resources, better training, and stronger policy tools to identify victims sooner, prosecute traffickers more effectively, and provide survivors with meaningful pathways to recovery and independence.

The fight against modern-day slavery is far from over. We will continue building on this momentum until every survivor has access to justice and every trafficker is held accountable. The next phase of this fight will be defined by expanding partnerships, equipping states, empowering survivors, and turning shared commitment into lasting action.

That is how traffickers are defeated. That is how survivors find justice. And that is how we build a future where human trafficking has no place in America.

Mercedes Schlapp is a Senior Fellow at CPAC, where Frank Russo is Senior Advisor for Human Dignity and Combating Human Trafficking.