September 26, 2025 • 30 mins
Most people think pencils and paper, books and backpacks when they think about the back-to-school season. Officials with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security say it is a critical time to spot and stop human trafficking. To learn more about how to start a conversation about it with the young people in our lives, we're talking to Erica Reid, the Acting Section Chief for the Center for Countering Human Trafficking.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Welcome to Virginia Focus. I'm Rebecca Hughes of the Virginia
News Network. Most people think pencils and paper books and
backpacks when they think about back to school season. Officials
with the US Department of Homeland Security say it's a
critical time to spot and stop human trafficking. To learn
more about how to start the conversation about it with
young people in our lives, we're talking to Erica Reid,
(00:27):
the acting Section chief for the Center for Countering Human Trafficking.
Welcome to the show. I'm glad to have you on today.
I think it's very important that we talk about these things,
and I love the concept of talking about it during
back to school season.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Thank you, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
So when don't we start by telling the audience kind
of who you are, what do you do, who do
you work for? Why are you the expert in this area?
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So I work for Department Homeland Security and the Center
for Counting Human Trafficking. In the office I work in
is called the Blue Campaign. The Blue Campaign we are
a national public awareness campaign. Our job is to educate
the public on how to recognize and report possible cases
of human trafficking. So we go out and we educate
the public on how to do those two things. The
(01:16):
way that we do it is we work with subject
matter experts throughout the year. Our subject matter experts can
be law enforcement end users. We have to think about
the young people, how we connect with them, also our
service providers. And then most importantly, we work with lived
experienced experts or we call them other people call them
(01:38):
survivors of human trafficking as well, and they help us
make sure our information that we're providing, or our trainings
or our awareness materials are realistic and relevant to the public.
And so we have an element, a foundational element. We're
trying to make sure that we're preventing it from happening
through education and protecting those that are being victimized through
(01:59):
education as well.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Okay, I love that because I've done a few of
these interviews over the years that have been in news,
and the one thing that seems to be a constant
is sometimes women who end up being trafficked, you know,
they find themselves defending the person that's putting in putting
them in that position, and they don't realize the exactly
(02:23):
what situation they've gotten themselves into. Is that part of
what you mean when you say you talk to victims
and whatnot, Well, we actually.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Have a consultant network, so they actually consult with us
to help us make sure that the products that we're
pushing out are realistic and relevant to the community. Now,
when we do talk about those that are victimized by
the crime, we do make sure that we train people
to understand that it doesn't only have to be women.
(02:51):
It could also be men and boys that are victimized
by the crime. And we understand that there could be
a lot of psychological manipulation prior to the trafficking and
even throughout the trafficking as well.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Right, And I know, you know, in my lifetime at least,
and I'm going to date myself here, but you know,
when I was a kid, it was all about making
sure you were not molested and that you knew that
no one should be run your no, no parts, and
you know, things of that nature. And it seems like
human trafficking has really, in the last i don't know
(03:27):
ten or so years, really blown up to be a
big subject that we didn't hear much about before. But
that doesn't make it new, right, No.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
It doesn't make it new. And What we don't want
to do in human trafficking is dismiss any other particular crimes.
In human trafficking. We've been around for fifteen years. We
just celebrated our fifteenth anniversary in July this year. We
just want to make sure that we're pushing out awareness
about what it is. We still talk about, you know,
(03:59):
the different things as far as grooming, how people meet
someone that as a potential trafficker, is meeting someone that
could be a potential victim to it. Those are just
some of the things we talk about, tactics and target,
how they target as well. So even though this may
seem like it's a new one, it's nothing new once
(04:19):
we hear about the particular crime. And like I said,
we've been around for fifteen years.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
Okay, so why don't we get into a little bit
of that nitty gritty If you don't mind, why don't
you tell us? You know, generally speaking, is this something
where teenage girls and boys are meeting people that are
dragging them into this? Is this parental and guardian type
people pushing kids into this? Is it everything you know
(04:46):
under the sun? I mean, what should we be looking for?
Speaker 2 (04:49):
It is all of the above that you just said.
When we think about how traffickers might target, especially we're
talking about school age students today. Violence, We know violence
can be away. I think Hollywood does a great job
of just showing violence. But we also have to think
about psychological manipulation. What does psychological manipulation look like. In
(05:11):
some cases, it can be threats, especially if maybe like
we had a case where someone was posting some videos
or images and they were like, if you don't do this,
we'll share them. We'll you know, we'll show them with everyone,
or we'll tell them about what you have going on.
Fake job offers is another way that they can target.
You know, always tell students that if it's too good
(05:33):
to be true of a job offer, then it probably
is too good to be true romantic relationships or employers,
you know, pretending that they're one way and they are
actually traffickers. And then we know that traffickers can use
other younger people or other adults as peer to peer
recruitment I meaning that they can also be victimized by
(05:54):
the crime, and they use them to recruit others to
be victimized by the crime as well. One of the
other things we want to know where they meet them
them all different parties. That's why we're here today to
talk about those everyday routines that we know younger people
with are with is like you know, being at the
school bus stop, or you know, going to those games,
(06:17):
meeting at their after school programs, and online when we
think about social media and those gaming sites as well.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
Yeah, I definitely think that's something we definitely need to
talk about. What about the kids who are born into this,
They don't know any different and they think that that's
what life is supposed to be. How do we reach
them to educate them that that's not what it's supposed
to be.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
So we definitely go out to schools and we you
can look up look our website up which is DHS
dot gov slash Blue campaign. We've heard of cases where
someone said I didn't know I was being trafficked, and
they didn't know so they actually seen a training or
was at a training on human trafficking. So what we
can do is what we do is we can go
(07:07):
out to different schools. We can train parents, we can
train adults that work with youth. We also can train
children between the ages of twelve to seventeen. We also
would like for a kids or adults working with you
to check out our website, to look at our videos,
look at what human trafficking is, what it looks like
in their community as well, what they can look out for.
(07:30):
I think it's very important to understand that that education
and pushing it out. We're talking about preventing it from
happening on the front end by educating on the front end,
but also protecting those that are victimized by so they're
in need of education as well.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
Yeah, I definitely agree with that. And when we say
human trafficking, obviously everybody kind of tends to think towards
sex trafficking, but there's also other types of trafficking, right,
that's true.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
We have sex trafficking, and we have forced legs and
forced labor can look like so many different things. Any
service that is provided can be a case of human
trafficking and a sense of maybe it can be an agriculture.
It can also be at hotels where you know it
might not be the guest, but it could be also
(08:18):
staff there can there can it can happen anywhere, and
it could also be in the homes. When we think
about like domestic servitude as Well, so we don't want
to dismiss the opportunity to not just talk about just
sex trafficking, but we also can talk about forced labor.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Too, right, And how do you educate the kids to
determine the difference between truly forced labor in their home
versus you're contributing to the family and you have to
clean up your toys and you have to keep your
room clean, and you know what I'm saying, Like I
remember as a kid, I remember thinking, you know, you're
just being so mean to me by making me do this.
(08:55):
And as kids, you know, they don't have the same
I mean, the cans are not the same as an
adult mind. We've shown that through science, and so they
process things differently. How do we help them to understand
that difference.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
Well, I think we have to think about Well, for one,
I'll talk about commercial sex really quick. If they are
under the age of eighteen engaging any commercial sex act,
it is considered human trafficking under law, and there it
doesn't have to be any force, fraud or cohersion. Now
when it comes to forced labor, we have to think
of the force or or the fraud and the conhersion.
(09:34):
Is there any force. Is there any like physical that's
going on. What is the well being of the child?
Are they going into are they going to school every day?
Does someone care about their mental their health, other things
could be cohersion. Are they being threatened in particular ways
to say if you don't do this, you know we're
(09:54):
going to do that or this is going to happen.
And it's a little different than than what we think,
not just like a parent then like you're not gonna
be able to go to the to the game or
something like that. Is it also has to think about
be mindful of the well being of the child as well.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
Yeah, most definitely. I've talked to some survivors myself, like
I said, through the years, and it was shocking to me.
One mentioned that their parent they were put into it
as children, Their parent was actually on the school board.
How do we recognize or is there a way to
recognize the people who are the buyers of these people
(10:35):
that are being trafficked. Is there a you know, is
it like the trafficking victims themselves, where it's just so
varied and wide that there's no way to know.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Well, we have to understand that, you know, the buyers
just like, if a trafficker can be anyone, the person
being victimized by the crime could be anyone, then we
have to know that buyers can be anyone as well.
So we don't want to just narrow down, you know,
saying this is what a buyer looks like, or this
is who the buyer could be. We have heard many
cases where in a case of trafficking, where it could
(11:11):
it has been many people, prominent people in the neighborhood,
prominent figures like you just said, someone that could sit
on a school board. It could be someone in a
CD location as well. So we don't want to tell
people at the Blue Campaign, we don't tell people like
this is only what it could look like. We let
people know that there are cases of it looking like
(11:32):
each and every person in any community.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
And as a person who wants to put a stop
to it, what kind of things do we need to
look for?
Speaker 2 (11:41):
So I think it's important to go to our website
always say DHS dot gov slash Blue Campaign. We have
a list of indicators of signs of what human trafficking
look like. We also have a lot of our videos
that we share that are free. You can download them
for free or you can share them with other people
(12:01):
to learn what the signs are. And from just learning
the signs, we don't stop there. We also want people
to report it. Once you know what it is, we
want you to know how to report it. Some indicators
when we think about younger people could be and I'll
give some just a small snippet of them. I always
tell people go to the website to learn a little
bit more bruising and not a student that is always
(12:24):
in a sports We have to think about bruising in
a sense of this is new. But behavioral changes. And these,
of course indicators are just some that I'm giving out.
They don't limit anything but behavioral changes. Maybe they were
outgoing at one time and they're not as outgoing, or
their grades have changed. In many cases, we talk to
(12:44):
those that are lived experienced experts or survivors and they
say that they're fatigued or tired all the time. That's
one indicator for younger people. We don't talk about this
one as much as often. And I've heard of a
case where a person is actually gifting a young person
expensive items, and that's a red flag for parents and adults.
(13:07):
Work with you to kind of take a look over
another one could be unexplained large amounts of money as well.
And then understanding what are their vulnerabilities if we know them,
do they have a home? Are they lacking support also?
And it's this a new environment for them. Are they
trying to make friends? Because we know traffickers can take
(13:28):
advantage of those vulnerabilities.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Yeah, and do you know, like if you see as
a parent, let's put it that away. As a parent,
if you see some of those possible vulnerabilities in your child,
you know that they struggle with self esteem. You know
that they struggle with you know, let's say you live
in poverty and they struggle with wanting what everybody else has.
(13:52):
How do you deal with that and encourage your child
and protect them in a way that they won't be
as susceptible to these perpetrators.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
I think first thing is we have to be clear
about what the definition of human trafficking is. It's very
clear to have a definition of the crime itself, saying hey,
this is what human trafficking is, this is what it
looked like, and then you can talk about risk factors
that younger people have. These are some of the risk
factors and not saying that they can't hold any power either,
(14:26):
because then you have to empower them, empower them to
understand and reinforce their values, reinforce an opportunity to say, hey,
you have control over yourself, you have control over your body,
and then know that you are that trusted adult. They
shouldn't know that as well. Hey, I'm the trusted adult.
I'm here. I'm here to support you. I'm here if
(14:48):
there's any open communication that's needed, and I'm also here
to report anything, report any cases of human trafficking as well.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Okay, I like that. I like that a lot. Is
there any age that's too young to have conversations like that, Well.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
We leave that to I would say, for us, I'll
tell you about us. We start at twelve. As far
as training for younger people, but I usually just leave
that to the discretion of the parent because they know
their child. They know what their child as far as
what they can with the knowledge base their skill set,
(15:24):
so we don't ever dismiss the opportunity to learn. And
they can go to our website. If they're like, hey,
I don't know what I can possibly tell my child, well,
they can go to our website. We have cartoons that
they can look over and look at that can probably
help them and start that open dialogue about what human
trafficking is.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Okay, that's awesome. I know when it comes to things
like addiction, whether that be alcohol or drugs, the research
and all has shown that, you know, we kind of
know what leads people into those things. Sometimes they're self
medicating for a mental health issue or maybe be a
trauma that they haven't healed from that also can lead
(16:04):
be led into when they are trying to fit in
with a group. You know what kind of things if
we know it lead to human trafficking.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
So that is considered a risk factor. Yes, we know.
And when we say risk factors and we think about vulnerabilities,
we don't want to dismiss someone who still has power,
but we know that traffickers can take advantage of people
in their risk factors. When we think about our hierarchy
of needs, the first thing that any person needs is food, water, shelter.
(16:35):
Then we have substance abuse that can be on there,
and we know that a trafficker can take advantage of
those things. Next up we have you know, support, love,
those type of things, and we can think about someone
taking advantage of someone who is, you know, maybe new
to love and they are looking for that romantic partner,
their first boyfriend or girlfriend. They can take advantage of
(16:56):
those things. And then we think about kids that, let's
think about it. Everyday kid that's new to a school.
We've all had that new to a high school, or
new to a junior high or maybe have moved to
a different neighborhood and just want to make friends where
someone can take advantage of that as well. So those
are like risk factors that play a role in it.
And if you know that, I still go back to adults.
(17:19):
It's just really good to cultivate an environment to make
children feel safe but also feel like they're needed and
wanted in that environment as well.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
I love that answer too. So I know Hollywood throughout
history has made it look like human trafficking is something
where your child or your teenager, or your wife or
your husband gets abducted and you never see them again
and they're wisked off. But that's not always the case either, right,
I mean, you're the expert. You tell us what else
(17:53):
can be happening.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Thank you for bringing up Hollywood. I tell you, the
first time that I ever thought of it. Prior to
you know, working in this in this space, it was like,
oh my gosh, this only happens overseas and it doesn't
happen here. Thank you for dispelling that myth. Yes, it
can happen overseas, and yes that's possible and that can happen,
but we also want people to know that it can
happen here as well, and it does happen here, and
(18:18):
that you can you don't even have to leave your
home for it to happen. You just brought that up
about it being someone in a home, and so we
want people and even children or adults work at youth
or even just adults in general, to know that human
trafficking happens everywhere. That's one myth. Another one like you
just brought up. I went to a high school and
I talked to some kids and I said, Hey, what's
(18:40):
human trafficking? And they said creepy white band B A N.
And I said, yes, that's possible. It could be a
stranger somebody you don't know, but what happens when it's not.
We want to, you know, make sure that kids know
that yes, it can be a stranger, but it could
also be an employer. It could be a a person
(19:00):
who pretends to be your friend. It could a person
who pretends to be a lover, or it can be
you know, just a person that you don't know, or
it could be a parent in some cases as well.
So we've definitely put that out there so that children
know exactly what human trafficking is. Another one is that
it can only be older men and girls, and we're like, no,
(19:24):
trafficking happens to men and boys as well, and that
the trafficker can be a woman. We give them cases.
There was a case where there was a mother of
the neighborhood pretending to be a mother of the neighborhood
taking care of some of the kids, and she actually
was trafficking them. So we want to make sure that
we are dispelling those myths so that you know, our
(19:46):
younger kids know exactly what it is whenever they're approached
with this situation.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
Yes, most definitely. And I think, and you tell me,
but I think that the white van is probably in
the minority as far as the stranger being the person
and that we need to watch out for. It's usually
somebody that has gotten in good with us at first, right.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
It can it can be that way. I don't ever
want to say, you know, I don't want to dismiss
the creepy white van, but yes, we have to be
mindful of grooming when we go and educate our younger
people and we train about what human trafficking is our
case that we have, or at least our storyline, which
is a cartoon. It's the MIAs Stories of four part
story on our website. She was actually groomed. You can
(20:28):
see what grooming actually look like. We even break it
down from her story to show exactly how Mia was targeted.
We talk about the isolation, how she was just hanging
out with this one person and not her friends, but
then we go into deeper about what it looked like
as well, those indicators. So yeah, we don't want to
dismiss the creepy white van and the kidnapping, but we
(20:52):
also yeah, like you said, we want to talk about
what grooming looks like as well.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Yeah, most definitely. Let me ask you this, and this
is more of a personal question. If you don't mind,
this job cannot be easy hearing these stories. I know
in my job is not easy, and you know, just
like in my job, you're hearing sometimes the worst possible
things that are just unimaginable for a reasonable human being.
(21:22):
Would you say, just hearing the stories takes a toll
on you and the people that you work with, and
how do y'all, you know, deal with that?
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Well? I think that we know how impactful the work
that we're doing is for the public. We know our
mission and we're focused on that mission and make sure
that we are getting out there hearing those stories. Let
us know that we need to be out there and
making sure that we are educating as much as possible
(21:54):
so that younger kids can recognize what it looked like
prior to and then if it is happening, that we
are in the business of making sure that they're reporting it.
I think that's probably the most thing when we think
about the work that we do and the stories that
we hear. We hear the stories and we know we
want to make sure we're preventing this as much as possible.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
Okay, I love that answer. So let's say that I
suspect something's going on. How do I report it? Do
I confront that person that I suspect is being a trafficker?
Do I, you know, try to get a confession out
of the victim, Do I contact the police immediately? Like,
(22:38):
what's the best course of action?
Speaker 2 (22:41):
I love when, you know, when we hear this story,
I like, you know, when anybody asks me this question,
I like answering it. Because when we go out and
talk to kids, we actually do a presentation for our
younger people, and one of the questions we ask them
are the answers that you just gave. And we're like,
we do not want you to go up to a trafficker.
And I give the example of why in MIA's story
(23:03):
in the cartoon that we use, we say, okay, let's
say that me as your friend, and you go up
to trafficker and you, you know, you tell them, don't
do this again to Mia, and you walk off with Mia.
But you didn't realize that the trafficker is a part
of a network and there are forty other MIAs in
that case, or let's just say they're part of another network,
and you wind up getting yourself harmed, You wind up
(23:25):
getting Mia harmed, who is being victimized by the crime,
and maybe even your family or friends harmed. So the
best thing that we tell people to do is to
be mindful of that is that you can always call
nine one one as well as there are reporting mechanisms
that we have on our website, to the National Human
Trafficking Hotline, to our tip line that you can also contact.
(23:49):
But what we most definitely emphasize is that you do
not go up to a trafficker and try to reason
with them or try to fight them off, because it's
for your safety and those being victimized by the crime
as well.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
I love that. Now. I hate to ask this question,
but I feel like in our current state of the world,
I kind of have to. Let's say, you're completely innocent,
but somebody has a vendetta. They don't like you, they
don't like your whatever it is that you don't agree
with them about. And you know, just in the case
of swatting and other false report, somebody makes a false
(24:26):
report that you are a trafficker when in fact you're not.
How do you defend yourself?
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Well, I think that really relies on the court system.
I probably wouldn't be able to answer that question. That
would probably be more of a Department of Justice question
as far as defending yourself, and we know that you know,
it really boils down to the court and investigation as well.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
Okay, I ask, because I imagine that may be part
of the reason why some people don't report, Because what
if I'm wrong and that's my best friend. What if
I'm wrong and that's my boyfriend or et cetera. You
know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
I can definitely answer that. Then let me go back
and answer that. So what we tell people is that
it doesn't hurt the report. Let us Let not myself
in the Blue campaign, but our agents. We have special
agents that are trained investigators. That's their job is to
go out and investigate whether or not it's trafficing or
not they able to make that determination. So we always
(25:23):
tell people it's better to report. If you know your
spotty senses are up and you see those indicators, it's
better to report than to just walk away and say,
I don't think they would want me to call.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
Okay, I love that. And I've seen something online about
some hand gesture with thumbs and fingers, and I don't know,
I don't remember how it goes. Is that something that
we really need to learn about and is that being
used and taught or is that just a social media thing.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
I've heard vaguely about it. I don't have enough information
on it to give you any answer on the.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Okay, good, We're in the same boat. I figured i'd
better ask though, because I'm sure I'm not the only
one who've seen it. So I like to ask this
question too. You are the expert. I'm just a curious
little cat over here trying to learn it all. So
is there anything that my audience needs to know that
(26:18):
I did not know that I needed to ask you
about it?
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Let's see, I have so many things to say. I'll
give you the definition of human trafficking. I think that's
most important. Human trafficking is a crime, and it's a
crime about exploiting a person, meaning using a person for
either commercial sex or labor. And how is it done
do either forcing them to do it, frauding them to
do it, and or even cohursing them to do it.
(26:46):
To learn more about those they can go to our
website to learn more about force, frauding, conhersion in different cases. Also,
another thing to learn is that trafficking does not require movement,
that it can happen anywhere. It can happen in a community,
it can happen in the suburbs, it can happen in
the city. It can happen in a home, and that
(27:07):
person can stay in at one place and be trafficked.
Another thing is, and I think we talked about it today,
but I definitely want to say it again, is that
you don't have to be kidnapped for trafficking to happen.
As well. You can be kidnapped in some cases, but
understand that in many cases also that the trafficker is
someone they may know or have been groomed to know
(27:29):
as well, and that men and boys also can be
victims to human trafficking, and that we also I'll give
you one more plug. Please go to our website. I
think this is very important to learn more about human trafficking,
which is DHS dot gov slash blue campaign, and then
you also can learn about human trafficking. You can order
our materials from our website. They ship for free and
(27:52):
you can order them for free and you can post
them up and raise awareness. We still have power too,
and the power is through education.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
I love that. I love that so much so. The
only thing I can think of that I probably haven't
asked you yet, is if I am somehow involved in
education early childhood all the way through college or I
work in a civic organization and I've heard this interview
and I'm really interested in getting somebody to come out
(28:22):
and talk to my group. How do I do that.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
You can go to our website, which is DHS dot
gov slash blue campaign, and you can email us from
there and then we can reach out to you. It's
free for us to even train, just like it's free.
Our materials are free. It's free for us to either.
We can do it virtual and we can also we
also have done in person events as well, and we
(28:50):
start at age twelve and up twelve to I would
say one hundred and twelve.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
I love that. Twelve to one hundred and twelve, I
love it. I love it because I think it also
happens probably to our elderly and we just don't know.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
Yeah. Yeah, we tell people all the time, human trafficking
doesn't have a face, and those that are victimized by
the crime, they don't have a face as well, that
meaning that it can happen to anyone.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
Well, thank you so much for your time today. I
know this is a very sensitive subject, but one that
is extremely important and I'm glad that I can be
a part of helping getting the message out.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Yeah, yeah, thank you for allowing us to speak on this.
We really appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
I hope you've enjoyed today's show. Thanks for tuning into
the show on your favorite local radio station. You can
now listen to this show or past shows through the
iheartapp or on iHeart dot com. Just search for Virginia
Focus under podcasts. I'm Rebecca Hughes with a Virginia news network,
and I'll be here next week on Virginia Focus.
Welcome to Virginia Focus. I'm Rebecca Hughes of the Virginia
News Network. Most people think pencils and paper books and
backpacks when they think about back to school season. Officials
with the US Department of Homeland Security say it's a
critical time to spot and stop human trafficking. To learn
more about how to start the conversation about it with
young people in our lives, we're talking to Erica Reid,
(00:27):
the acting Section chief for the Center for Countering Human Trafficking.
Welcome to the show. I'm glad to have you on today.
I think it's very important that we talk about these things,
and I love the concept of talking about it during
back to school season.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Thank you, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
So when don't we start by telling the audience kind
of who you are, what do you do, who do
you work for? Why are you the expert in this area?
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So I work for Department Homeland Security and the Center
for Counting Human Trafficking. In the office I work in
is called the Blue Campaign. The Blue Campaign we are
a national public awareness campaign. Our job is to educate
the public on how to recognize and report possible cases
of human trafficking. So we go out and we educate
the public on how to do those two things. The
(01:16):
way that we do it is we work with subject
matter experts throughout the year. Our subject matter experts can
be law enforcement end users. We have to think about
the young people, how we connect with them, also our
service providers. And then most importantly, we work with lived
experienced experts or we call them other people call them
(01:38):
survivors of human trafficking as well, and they help us
make sure our information that we're providing, or our trainings
or our awareness materials are realistic and relevant to the public.
And so we have an element, a foundational element. We're
trying to make sure that we're preventing it from happening
through education and protecting those that are being victimized through
(01:59):
education as well.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Okay, I love that because I've done a few of
these interviews over the years that have been in news,
and the one thing that seems to be a constant
is sometimes women who end up being trafficked, you know,
they find themselves defending the person that's putting in putting
them in that position, and they don't realize the exactly
(02:23):
what situation they've gotten themselves into. Is that part of
what you mean when you say you talk to victims
and whatnot, Well, we actually.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Have a consultant network, so they actually consult with us
to help us make sure that the products that we're
pushing out are realistic and relevant to the community. Now,
when we do talk about those that are victimized by
the crime, we do make sure that we train people
to understand that it doesn't only have to be women.
(02:51):
It could also be men and boys that are victimized
by the crime. And we understand that there could be
a lot of psychological manipulation prior to the trafficking and
even throughout the trafficking as well.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Right, And I know, you know, in my lifetime at least,
and I'm going to date myself here, but you know,
when I was a kid, it was all about making
sure you were not molested and that you knew that
no one should be run your no, no parts, and
you know, things of that nature. And it seems like
human trafficking has really, in the last i don't know
(03:27):
ten or so years, really blown up to be a
big subject that we didn't hear much about before. But
that doesn't make it new, right, No.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
It doesn't make it new. And What we don't want
to do in human trafficking is dismiss any other particular crimes.
In human trafficking. We've been around for fifteen years. We
just celebrated our fifteenth anniversary in July this year. We
just want to make sure that we're pushing out awareness
about what it is. We still talk about, you know,
(03:59):
the different things as far as grooming, how people meet
someone that as a potential trafficker, is meeting someone that
could be a potential victim to it. Those are just
some of the things we talk about, tactics and target,
how they target as well. So even though this may
seem like it's a new one, it's nothing new once
(04:19):
we hear about the particular crime. And like I said,
we've been around for fifteen years.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
Okay, so why don't we get into a little bit
of that nitty gritty If you don't mind, why don't
you tell us? You know, generally speaking, is this something
where teenage girls and boys are meeting people that are
dragging them into this? Is this parental and guardian type
people pushing kids into this? Is it everything you know
(04:46):
under the sun? I mean, what should we be looking for?
Speaker 2 (04:49):
It is all of the above that you just said.
When we think about how traffickers might target, especially we're
talking about school age students today. Violence, We know violence
can be away. I think Hollywood does a great job
of just showing violence. But we also have to think
about psychological manipulation. What does psychological manipulation look like. In
(05:11):
some cases, it can be threats, especially if maybe like
we had a case where someone was posting some videos
or images and they were like, if you don't do this,
we'll share them. We'll you know, we'll show them with everyone,
or we'll tell them about what you have going on.
Fake job offers is another way that they can target.
You know, always tell students that if it's too good
(05:33):
to be true of a job offer, then it probably
is too good to be true romantic relationships or employers,
you know, pretending that they're one way and they are
actually traffickers. And then we know that traffickers can use
other younger people or other adults as peer to peer
recruitment I meaning that they can also be victimized by
(05:54):
the crime, and they use them to recruit others to
be victimized by the crime as well. One of the
other things we want to know where they meet them
them all different parties. That's why we're here today to
talk about those everyday routines that we know younger people
with are with is like you know, being at the
school bus stop, or you know, going to those games,
(06:17):
meeting at their after school programs, and online when we
think about social media and those gaming sites as well.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
Yeah, I definitely think that's something we definitely need to
talk about. What about the kids who are born into this,
They don't know any different and they think that that's
what life is supposed to be. How do we reach
them to educate them that that's not what it's supposed
to be.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
So we definitely go out to schools and we you
can look up look our website up which is DHS
dot gov slash Blue campaign. We've heard of cases where
someone said I didn't know I was being trafficked, and
they didn't know so they actually seen a training or
was at a training on human trafficking. So what we
can do is what we do is we can go
(07:07):
out to different schools. We can train parents, we can
train adults that work with youth. We also can train
children between the ages of twelve to seventeen. We also
would like for a kids or adults working with you
to check out our website, to look at our videos,
look at what human trafficking is, what it looks like
in their community as well, what they can look out for.
(07:30):
I think it's very important to understand that that education
and pushing it out. We're talking about preventing it from
happening on the front end by educating on the front end,
but also protecting those that are victimized by so they're
in need of education as well.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
Yeah, I definitely agree with that. And when we say
human trafficking, obviously everybody kind of tends to think towards
sex trafficking, but there's also other types of trafficking, right,
that's true.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
We have sex trafficking, and we have forced legs and
forced labor can look like so many different things. Any
service that is provided can be a case of human
trafficking and a sense of maybe it can be an agriculture.
It can also be at hotels where you know it
might not be the guest, but it could be also
(08:18):
staff there can there can it can happen anywhere, and
it could also be in the homes. When we think
about like domestic servitude as Well, so we don't want
to dismiss the opportunity to not just talk about just
sex trafficking, but we also can talk about forced labor.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Too, right, And how do you educate the kids to
determine the difference between truly forced labor in their home
versus you're contributing to the family and you have to
clean up your toys and you have to keep your
room clean, and you know what I'm saying, Like I
remember as a kid, I remember thinking, you know, you're
just being so mean to me by making me do this.
(08:55):
And as kids, you know, they don't have the same
I mean, the cans are not the same as an
adult mind. We've shown that through science, and so they
process things differently. How do we help them to understand
that difference.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
Well, I think we have to think about Well, for one,
I'll talk about commercial sex really quick. If they are
under the age of eighteen engaging any commercial sex act,
it is considered human trafficking under law, and there it
doesn't have to be any force, fraud or cohersion. Now
when it comes to forced labor, we have to think
of the force or or the fraud and the conhersion.
(09:34):
Is there any force. Is there any like physical that's
going on. What is the well being of the child?
Are they going into are they going to school every day?
Does someone care about their mental their health, other things
could be cohersion. Are they being threatened in particular ways
to say if you don't do this, you know we're
(09:54):
going to do that or this is going to happen.
And it's a little different than than what we think,
not just like a parent then like you're not gonna
be able to go to the to the game or
something like that. Is it also has to think about
be mindful of the well being of the child as well.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
Yeah, most definitely. I've talked to some survivors myself, like
I said, through the years, and it was shocking to me.
One mentioned that their parent they were put into it
as children, Their parent was actually on the school board.
How do we recognize or is there a way to
recognize the people who are the buyers of these people
(10:35):
that are being trafficked. Is there a you know, is
it like the trafficking victims themselves, where it's just so
varied and wide that there's no way to know.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Well, we have to understand that, you know, the buyers
just like, if a trafficker can be anyone, the person
being victimized by the crime could be anyone, then we
have to know that buyers can be anyone as well.
So we don't want to just narrow down, you know,
saying this is what a buyer looks like, or this
is who the buyer could be. We have heard many
cases where in a case of trafficking, where it could
(11:11):
it has been many people, prominent people in the neighborhood,
prominent figures like you just said, someone that could sit
on a school board. It could be someone in a
CD location as well. So we don't want to tell
people at the Blue Campaign, we don't tell people like
this is only what it could look like. We let
people know that there are cases of it looking like
(11:32):
each and every person in any community.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
And as a person who wants to put a stop
to it, what kind of things do we need to
look for?
Speaker 2 (11:41):
So I think it's important to go to our website
always say DHS dot gov slash Blue Campaign. We have
a list of indicators of signs of what human trafficking
look like. We also have a lot of our videos
that we share that are free. You can download them
for free or you can share them with other people
(12:01):
to learn what the signs are. And from just learning
the signs, we don't stop there. We also want people
to report it. Once you know what it is, we
want you to know how to report it. Some indicators
when we think about younger people could be and I'll
give some just a small snippet of them. I always
tell people go to the website to learn a little
bit more bruising and not a student that is always
(12:24):
in a sports We have to think about bruising in
a sense of this is new. But behavioral changes. And these,
of course indicators are just some that I'm giving out.
They don't limit anything but behavioral changes. Maybe they were
outgoing at one time and they're not as outgoing, or
their grades have changed. In many cases, we talk to
(12:44):
those that are lived experienced experts or survivors and they
say that they're fatigued or tired all the time. That's
one indicator for younger people. We don't talk about this
one as much as often. And I've heard of a
case where a person is actually gifting a young person
expensive items, and that's a red flag for parents and adults.
(13:07):
Work with you to kind of take a look over
another one could be unexplained large amounts of money as well.
And then understanding what are their vulnerabilities if we know them,
do they have a home? Are they lacking support also?
And it's this a new environment for them. Are they
trying to make friends? Because we know traffickers can take
(13:28):
advantage of those vulnerabilities.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Yeah, and do you know, like if you see as
a parent, let's put it that away. As a parent,
if you see some of those possible vulnerabilities in your child,
you know that they struggle with self esteem. You know
that they struggle with you know, let's say you live
in poverty and they struggle with wanting what everybody else has.
(13:52):
How do you deal with that and encourage your child
and protect them in a way that they won't be
as susceptible to these perpetrators.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
I think first thing is we have to be clear
about what the definition of human trafficking is. It's very
clear to have a definition of the crime itself, saying hey,
this is what human trafficking is, this is what it
looked like, and then you can talk about risk factors
that younger people have. These are some of the risk
factors and not saying that they can't hold any power either,
(14:26):
because then you have to empower them, empower them to
understand and reinforce their values, reinforce an opportunity to say, hey,
you have control over yourself, you have control over your body,
and then know that you are that trusted adult. They
shouldn't know that as well. Hey, I'm the trusted adult.
I'm here. I'm here to support you. I'm here if
(14:48):
there's any open communication that's needed, and I'm also here
to report anything, report any cases of human trafficking as well.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Okay, I like that. I like that a lot. Is
there any age that's too young to have conversations like that, Well.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
We leave that to I would say, for us, I'll
tell you about us. We start at twelve. As far
as training for younger people, but I usually just leave
that to the discretion of the parent because they know
their child. They know what their child as far as
what they can with the knowledge base their skill set,
(15:24):
so we don't ever dismiss the opportunity to learn. And
they can go to our website. If they're like, hey,
I don't know what I can possibly tell my child, well,
they can go to our website. We have cartoons that
they can look over and look at that can probably
help them and start that open dialogue about what human
trafficking is.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Okay, that's awesome. I know when it comes to things
like addiction, whether that be alcohol or drugs, the research
and all has shown that, you know, we kind of
know what leads people into those things. Sometimes they're self
medicating for a mental health issue or maybe be a
trauma that they haven't healed from that also can lead
(16:04):
be led into when they are trying to fit in
with a group. You know what kind of things if
we know it lead to human trafficking.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
So that is considered a risk factor. Yes, we know.
And when we say risk factors and we think about vulnerabilities,
we don't want to dismiss someone who still has power,
but we know that traffickers can take advantage of people
in their risk factors. When we think about our hierarchy
of needs, the first thing that any person needs is food, water, shelter.
(16:35):
Then we have substance abuse that can be on there,
and we know that a trafficker can take advantage of
those things. Next up we have you know, support, love,
those type of things, and we can think about someone
taking advantage of someone who is, you know, maybe new
to love and they are looking for that romantic partner,
their first boyfriend or girlfriend. They can take advantage of
(16:56):
those things. And then we think about kids that, let's
think about it. Everyday kid that's new to a school.
We've all had that new to a high school, or
new to a junior high or maybe have moved to
a different neighborhood and just want to make friends where
someone can take advantage of that as well. So those
are like risk factors that play a role in it.
And if you know that, I still go back to adults.
(17:19):
It's just really good to cultivate an environment to make
children feel safe but also feel like they're needed and
wanted in that environment as well.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
I love that answer too. So I know Hollywood throughout
history has made it look like human trafficking is something
where your child or your teenager, or your wife or
your husband gets abducted and you never see them again
and they're wisked off. But that's not always the case either, right,
I mean, you're the expert. You tell us what else
(17:53):
can be happening.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Thank you for bringing up Hollywood. I tell you, the
first time that I ever thought of it. Prior to
you know, working in this in this space, it was like,
oh my gosh, this only happens overseas and it doesn't
happen here. Thank you for dispelling that myth. Yes, it
can happen overseas, and yes that's possible and that can happen,
but we also want people to know that it can
happen here as well, and it does happen here, and
(18:18):
that you can you don't even have to leave your
home for it to happen. You just brought that up
about it being someone in a home, and so we
want people and even children or adults work at youth
or even just adults in general, to know that human
trafficking happens everywhere. That's one myth. Another one like you
just brought up. I went to a high school and
I talked to some kids and I said, Hey, what's
(18:40):
human trafficking? And they said creepy white band B A N.
And I said, yes, that's possible. It could be a
stranger somebody you don't know, but what happens when it's not.
We want to, you know, make sure that kids know
that yes, it can be a stranger, but it could
also be an employer. It could be a a person
(19:00):
who pretends to be your friend. It could a person
who pretends to be a lover, or it can be
you know, just a person that you don't know, or
it could be a parent in some cases as well.
So we've definitely put that out there so that children
know exactly what human trafficking is. Another one is that
it can only be older men and girls, and we're like, no,
(19:24):
trafficking happens to men and boys as well, and that
the trafficker can be a woman. We give them cases.
There was a case where there was a mother of
the neighborhood pretending to be a mother of the neighborhood
taking care of some of the kids, and she actually
was trafficking them. So we want to make sure that
we are dispelling those myths so that you know, our
(19:46):
younger kids know exactly what it is whenever they're approached
with this situation.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
Yes, most definitely. And I think, and you tell me,
but I think that the white van is probably in
the minority as far as the stranger being the person
and that we need to watch out for. It's usually
somebody that has gotten in good with us at first, right.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
It can it can be that way. I don't ever
want to say, you know, I don't want to dismiss
the creepy white van, but yes, we have to be
mindful of grooming when we go and educate our younger
people and we train about what human trafficking is our
case that we have, or at least our storyline, which
is a cartoon. It's the MIAs Stories of four part
story on our website. She was actually groomed. You can
(20:28):
see what grooming actually look like. We even break it
down from her story to show exactly how Mia was targeted.
We talk about the isolation, how she was just hanging
out with this one person and not her friends, but
then we go into deeper about what it looked like
as well, those indicators. So yeah, we don't want to
dismiss the creepy white van and the kidnapping, but we
(20:52):
also yeah, like you said, we want to talk about
what grooming looks like as well.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Yeah, most definitely. Let me ask you this, and this
is more of a personal question. If you don't mind,
this job cannot be easy hearing these stories. I know
in my job is not easy, and you know, just
like in my job, you're hearing sometimes the worst possible
things that are just unimaginable for a reasonable human being.
(21:22):
Would you say, just hearing the stories takes a toll
on you and the people that you work with, and
how do y'all, you know, deal with that?
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Well? I think that we know how impactful the work
that we're doing is for the public. We know our
mission and we're focused on that mission and make sure
that we are getting out there hearing those stories. Let
us know that we need to be out there and
making sure that we are educating as much as possible
(21:54):
so that younger kids can recognize what it looked like
prior to and then if it is happening, that we
are in the business of making sure that they're reporting it.
I think that's probably the most thing when we think
about the work that we do and the stories that
we hear. We hear the stories and we know we
want to make sure we're preventing this as much as possible.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
Okay, I love that answer. So let's say that I
suspect something's going on. How do I report it? Do
I confront that person that I suspect is being a trafficker?
Do I, you know, try to get a confession out
of the victim, Do I contact the police immediately? Like,
(22:38):
what's the best course of action?
Speaker 2 (22:41):
I love when, you know, when we hear this story,
I like, you know, when anybody asks me this question,
I like answering it. Because when we go out and
talk to kids, we actually do a presentation for our
younger people, and one of the questions we ask them
are the answers that you just gave. And we're like,
we do not want you to go up to a trafficker.
And I give the example of why in MIA's story
(23:03):
in the cartoon that we use, we say, okay, let's
say that me as your friend, and you go up
to trafficker and you, you know, you tell them, don't
do this again to Mia, and you walk off with Mia.
But you didn't realize that the trafficker is a part
of a network and there are forty other MIAs in
that case, or let's just say they're part of another network,
and you wind up getting yourself harmed, You wind up
(23:25):
getting Mia harmed, who is being victimized by the crime,
and maybe even your family or friends harmed. So the
best thing that we tell people to do is to
be mindful of that is that you can always call
nine one one as well as there are reporting mechanisms
that we have on our website, to the National Human
Trafficking Hotline, to our tip line that you can also contact.
(23:49):
But what we most definitely emphasize is that you do
not go up to a trafficker and try to reason
with them or try to fight them off, because it's
for your safety and those being victimized by the crime
as well.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
I love that. Now. I hate to ask this question,
but I feel like in our current state of the world,
I kind of have to. Let's say, you're completely innocent,
but somebody has a vendetta. They don't like you, they
don't like your whatever it is that you don't agree
with them about. And you know, just in the case
of swatting and other false report, somebody makes a false
(24:26):
report that you are a trafficker when in fact you're not.
How do you defend yourself?
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Well, I think that really relies on the court system.
I probably wouldn't be able to answer that question. That
would probably be more of a Department of Justice question
as far as defending yourself, and we know that you know,
it really boils down to the court and investigation as well.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
Okay, I ask, because I imagine that may be part
of the reason why some people don't report, Because what
if I'm wrong and that's my best friend. What if
I'm wrong and that's my boyfriend or et cetera. You
know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
I can definitely answer that. Then let me go back
and answer that. So what we tell people is that
it doesn't hurt the report. Let us Let not myself
in the Blue campaign, but our agents. We have special
agents that are trained investigators. That's their job is to
go out and investigate whether or not it's trafficing or
not they able to make that determination. So we always
(25:23):
tell people it's better to report. If you know your
spotty senses are up and you see those indicators, it's
better to report than to just walk away and say,
I don't think they would want me to call.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
Okay, I love that. And I've seen something online about
some hand gesture with thumbs and fingers, and I don't know,
I don't remember how it goes. Is that something that
we really need to learn about and is that being
used and taught or is that just a social media thing.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
I've heard vaguely about it. I don't have enough information
on it to give you any answer on the.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Okay, good, We're in the same boat. I figured i'd
better ask though, because I'm sure I'm not the only
one who've seen it. So I like to ask this
question too. You are the expert. I'm just a curious
little cat over here trying to learn it all. So
is there anything that my audience needs to know that
(26:18):
I did not know that I needed to ask you
about it?
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Let's see, I have so many things to say. I'll
give you the definition of human trafficking. I think that's
most important. Human trafficking is a crime, and it's a
crime about exploiting a person, meaning using a person for
either commercial sex or labor. And how is it done
do either forcing them to do it, frauding them to
do it, and or even cohursing them to do it.
(26:46):
To learn more about those they can go to our
website to learn more about force, frauding, conhersion in different cases. Also,
another thing to learn is that trafficking does not require movement,
that it can happen anywhere. It can happen in a community,
it can happen in the suburbs, it can happen in
the city. It can happen in a home, and that
(27:07):
person can stay in at one place and be trafficked.
Another thing is, and I think we talked about it today,
but I definitely want to say it again, is that
you don't have to be kidnapped for trafficking to happen.
As well. You can be kidnapped in some cases, but
understand that in many cases also that the trafficker is
someone they may know or have been groomed to know
(27:29):
as well, and that men and boys also can be
victims to human trafficking, and that we also I'll give
you one more plug. Please go to our website. I
think this is very important to learn more about human trafficking,
which is DHS dot gov slash blue campaign, and then
you also can learn about human trafficking. You can order
our materials from our website. They ship for free and
(27:52):
you can order them for free and you can post
them up and raise awareness. We still have power too,
and the power is through education.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
I love that. I love that so much so. The
only thing I can think of that I probably haven't
asked you yet, is if I am somehow involved in
education early childhood all the way through college or I
work in a civic organization and I've heard this interview
and I'm really interested in getting somebody to come out
(28:22):
and talk to my group. How do I do that.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
You can go to our website, which is DHS dot
gov slash blue campaign, and you can email us from
there and then we can reach out to you. It's
free for us to even train, just like it's free.
Our materials are free. It's free for us to either.
We can do it virtual and we can also we
also have done in person events as well, and we
(28:50):
start at age twelve and up twelve to I would
say one hundred and twelve.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
I love that. Twelve to one hundred and twelve, I
love it. I love it because I think it also
happens probably to our elderly and we just don't know.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
Yeah. Yeah, we tell people all the time, human trafficking
doesn't have a face, and those that are victimized by
the crime, they don't have a face as well, that
meaning that it can happen to anyone.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
Well, thank you so much for your time today. I
know this is a very sensitive subject, but one that
is extremely important and I'm glad that I can be
a part of helping getting the message out.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Yeah, yeah, thank you for allowing us to speak on this.
We really appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
I hope you've enjoyed today's show. Thanks for tuning into
the show on your favorite local radio station. You can
now listen to this show or past shows through the
iheartapp or on iHeart dot com. Just search for Virginia
Focus under podcasts. I'm Rebecca Hughes with a Virginia news network,
and I'll be here next week on Virginia Focus.
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