This is apart of the series to promote a National AAPI Week of Action for comprehensive immigration reform.

Monday, January 11^th, National Human Trafficking Awareness Day, marked the launch of the Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking’s (CAST) month-long anti-human trafficking awareness campaign. Throughout the campaign, coalition partners, including Thai Community Development Center (Thai CDC), has events scattered to raise awareness. The month will come to a close with an Emancipation Concert on February 12^th.

This campaign is just one way that human trafficking is being fought every day. Most days I come in to the office here at Thai CDC, I am responding to victims of human trafficking who need help. They find that there is help out there through word of mouth. Usually friends who have escaped their traffickers contact others. Once they contact us we assist them in any way we can. This usually means finding legal aid, government benefits, affordable housing, medical care, etc. Thais in particular have a huge language barrier here in the United States. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are over 20,000 Thais in Los Angeles County. However, Thai speakers are exceedingly difficult to find when it comes to accessing healthcare, social services, and legal assistance. Many times Thai speaking caseworkers will go along with the victim just because there are no Thai interpreters available.This is how I came to know stories of victims of human trafficking in more detail. I am surprised to find that many agencies do not have the language capabilities to assist victims even though there are laws in place to protect them and grant them benefits.

A comprehensive immigration reform package would require the development and implementation of a plan to improve coordination amongst federal and state partners to address human trafficking. Such a plan would decrease the time a victim of trafficking has to wait in order to receive benefits and allow for greater communication between the victim herself and the agencies involved in her case. For instance there is a huge lag time when a federal agency contacts a victim's attorney for information because the attorney will then in turn contact Thai CDC. Thai CDC is then the only interface tool with the client. When the information, say a Thai docment gets sent back through the same channels, they don' t have the capabilities to translate the document. And well, you know how it is with understaffed notprofit orgs--more clients than staff can handle at once.

It is unfortunate that immigrants today enter as victims of human trafficking. Yet undeniable that they are a face of immigration that cannot be overlooked. It is my hope that this comprehensive immigration reform package assists government agencies in the prosecution of human traffickers and allows for greater access to benefits for the trafficked victims.