Sometime between April 21 and May 28, the Biden administration’s Department of Justice removed substantial sections of information regarding child sex trafficking from its website, the New York Post reported.
The website changes sparked concern among survivors and anti-child-trafficking advocates who accused the administration of deprioritizing the heinous crime.
The DOJ’s current webpage about child sex trafficking, compared to an archived version from April, reveals that the agency removed entire sections discussing “Domestic Sex Trafficking of Minors” and “Child Victims of Prostitution.”
The original version of the webpage also included a section labeled “International Sex Trafficking of Minors,” addressing how children are trafficked over the border.
“One form of sex trafficking involves the cross border transportation of children. In these situations, traffickers recruit and transfer children across international borders in order to sexually exploit them in another country,” the website previously stated.
According to a State Department report, approximately 600,000 to 800,000 people are trafficked across the border each year. Approximately 70% of those victims are women and 50% are children.
Victor Marx, the founder and CEO of All Things Possible Ministries, told the Post that the website changes “have raised valid concerns.”
Marx, a survivor of child sexual abuse, stated, “The message we’re sending to our children and the criminals, and the women at large that are concerned is the administration doesn’t care.”
“I think they’re trying to lower their culpability and responsibility,” he continued. “They’re having to lower and lessen their footprint and their position on this because believe me, it’s horrible and stories are going to start to come out.”
Jaco Booyens, the leader of an organization rescuing trafficking victims, told BlazeTV’s Sara Gonzales that scrubbing the information from the webpage was “100% a border move.”
“To tell the American people, ‘It’s a lie, it’s conspiracy, nothing to see here, our border is secure; we’re so confident that kids are not being sold for sex across our border that we’re going to lower the prioritization level of this,’” Booyens stated.
The DOJ denied the accusations that the agency is deprioritizing child trafficking.
“In the course of the Department publishing the most recent National Strategy, related content on various Department webpages was updated,” the spokesperson stated. “Just as it has during previous administrations, the Department continues to place a very high priority on and devote substantial resources to fighting child exploitation and child sex trafficking, both domestically and internationally. To suggest otherwise is simply false.”
“The 2023 National Strategy and supporting subject matter expert working group reports, including the Child Sex Trafficking in the United States, Livestreaming and Virtual Child Sex Trafficking, and Extraterritorial Child Sexual Abuse reports reflect the most up to date information about child exploitation including domestic minor sex trafficking, virtual child sex trafficking, and extraterritorial and transnational child sexual exploitation,” the agency spokesperson added.
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