June 2012

CHENNAI, INDIA – Late last week, IJM helped government officials in a rural area outside Chennai to rescue families forced to work as slaves in a rice mill and rock quarry. When the team of IJM staff and officials arrived, the families were hard at work – including several children.

The high-ranking government official in charge of the operation issued release certificates to 25 men, women and children, emancipating them from slavery and cancelling any debts the owners claimed they were owed.

Today, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton released the 2012 Trafficking in Persons Report (TIP Report), a diplomatic tool used to fight human trafficking around the world. Tomorrow, we’ll give an update on the release of the TIP Report, but today we wanted to give you an opportunity to take action!

Every time I pick up the newspaper, I read an article about how the U.S. Congress is deadlocked, partisan, broken. That may be the case on some issues, but I know of one issue where members of Congress across the political spectrum are working together to do something good.  Our leaders are collaborating with integrity and good will to eradicate trafficking in U.S. labor contracts that recruit men and women to work on large U.S. military bases, such as those in Afghanistan. 

In 2007, I picked up an IJM brochure at a California church I was visiting. I came home to Idaho, ordered both of IJM President Gary Haugen's books and read them within weeks. The reality of modern-day slavery and human trafficking overwhelmed me - the darkness of the issue paralyzed me.

There was a question that had haunted me for years: Why was there still so much poverty, pain and suffering throughout the world when so much had been done to alleviate these very issues?