The California Senate will vote soon on AB 364 by Assemblyman Freddie Rodriguez. The Foreign Labor Contractor Registration bill is a quiet piece of legislation with the potential to speak loudly to our values and commitment to human rights. 

If passed, AB 364 would extend anti-trafficking protections to all temporary workers in California, particularly by targeting unethical, and often criminal foreign labor contractors (FLCs). 

State and federal law currently protects against labor trafficking by providing criminal and civil sanctions against employers who engage in trafficking. However, current law leaves major regulatory gaps at the point of recruitment, through which thousands of migrant victims fall prey. 

Once here, traffickers control their victims through fraud, force, and coercion.

 This lack of protection can have disastrous consequences, with unscrupulous FLCs luring migrant workers into the US with the promise of good jobs only to then be labor and/or sex trafficked. 

Take the case of Raymundo, who was recruited from rural Mexico to work in California avocado groves. He was promised high wages, room and board.  Once here, he was forced to work long hours without breaks, never paid what he was promised, and was forced to live in a large room with over 30 other men.  They were held in the farm camp, not allowed visitors, and not allowed to leave.  He was constantly monitored, verbally harassed, and threatened with deportation if he did not obey the traffickers.  Through sheer bravery and grit, Raymundo managed to escape and seek services.  He now works for a farm where he feels respected and welcomed, where he can live reunited with his family.

 Traffickers like the ones who controlled Raymundo purposefully target economically vulnerable people abroad who believe they are legally securing good jobs in the U.S.  Once here, traffickers control their victims through fraud, force, and coercion; and while the specific abuse victims endure varies, it can (and often does) include physical and sexual violence, amid threats of deportation or violence against the victim or their family.

Trafficking by FLCs disproportionately affects people of color, particularly Latino and API individuals.  Freedom Network, a national coalition of anti-trafficking organizations, reports 87% of trafficking survivors they serve are people of color.

Business support for the bill makes sense from both a financial and moral perspective.

 Taking California employers’ hiring history into account, it is clear that California employers need migrant workers, and rely on FLCs to recruit workers, handle their immigration, and make living arrangements. 

UC Davis reported that FLCs brought in about 143,000 agricultural crop workers in 2020 alone.  Without state regulations, well-intentioned businesses often cannot tell if the FLCs they use engage in ethical recruitment or human trafficking. 

This is what AB 364 seeks to remedy by 1) requiring all FLCs to register with the Labor Commission, 2) requiring California employers to use only registered FLCs, 3) requiring full and honest disclosure of working terms and conditions during the recruitment process, including no fees, and 4) enacting penalties for failure to comply with these requirements.  

 AB 364 has received support from an unusually broad alliance, including law enforcement, Fortune 500 companies, civil rights and legal aid organizations, and some 33,000 individuals including victims of trafficking like Raymundo. 

Business support for the bill makes sense from both a financial and moral perspective.  Businesses benefit from AB 364’s ensuring that FLCs recruiting for them do so ethically, thereby mitigating the legal liability they currently face if found to be profiting from forced labor. 

In addition, AB 364 reduces unfair competition from those businesses willingly using trafficked victims to undercut their competitors’ operating costs. 

The temporary workers who AB 364 protects are essential workers and fellow human beings. These are the people who take care of our elderly relatives in care homes, who keep food flowing to our table during the pandemic, and care for our homes and children.  These are not disposable roles in our society. 

We should honor the importance of their essential work by protecting them against trafficking in California. 

Our current system allows predators to operate among us, but we are better than that. 

Let’s make sure our laws reflect who we are at our best, instead of turning a blind eye to the worst of the worst.

In June 2002, Germania boarded a plane from Quito, Ecuador, to Washington, D.C. She was traveling to work for Verónica Peña, an Ecuadorian diplomat, caring for her home and her two children. Prior to her arrival in the U.S., Germania had been presented with a contract, promising full-time employment and earning minimum wage. She was told she’d live in the home with her employers and her needs would be provided for.

Germania had been granted a G-5 visa, a special visa reserved for the private staff of international officials so they can work legally while their employers are stationed in the U.S. 

Germania says she arrived in Washington, D.C. with a suitcase full of dreams. With a promise to work 40 hours a week, she planned to send money to her family back home to build a little house on their farm, and eventually return to Quito to open her own business.

But soon after she arrived in the U.S., Germania’s employers took her passport. It wasn’t long before she realized life in the U.S. was not going to be what she imagined.

Journalist Noy Thrupkaew investigated Germania’s story —as well as dozens of others— for an upcoming feature in The Washington Post Magazine. Noy learned that Germania’s experience as a diplomatic domestic worker in the U.S. was not uncommon. In fact, diplomatic domestic workers have been victims to all sorts of abuse, including labor trafficking, while working for diplomats in the U.S. And while lawyers, domestic worker organizers and advocates have won civil suits, settlements, and immigration relief for workers, along with a number of protections put in place by the U.S. government, advocates say that it’s still not enough to guarantee workers’ safety. 

In this episode of Latino USA, we explore how these special visas, which are expedited by the U.S. Department of State, can make workers extremely susceptible to exploitation by their employers, and the challenges that follow when trying to hold them accountable.

This report was investigated by Noy Thrupkaew, in collaboration with Latino USA and The Washington Post. Her work is supported by The Fund for Investigative Journalism.

The Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking (Cast) was awarded $3.54 million from the City of Los Angeles Housing and Community Investment Department (HCID) to purchase additional housing for survivors of human trafficking.  

“We are fortunate to have a leader on human trafficking like CAST in our city, where we are no strangers to the horrors of human trafficking,”  said Los Angeles City Council President, Nury Martinez. “Protecting women and children from abuse has been one of my top priorities and I am so proud to provide CAST with this funding because this organization is changing lives in our communities,” remarked Los Angeles City Council President, Nury Martinez.

This funding has come at a time when the need for safe housing has been particularly urgent for human trafficking survivors. During COVID-19, the amount of survivors seeking shelter with Cast has been nearly a third higher than normal. “100% of survivors who called our 24-hour emergency hotline during the pandemic were homeless. They were escaping both the traffickers and the pandemic,” said Rebecca Amado-Sprigg, Cast’s Associate Director of Equitable Housing.

Since the pandemic began, Cast has seen a 185% increase in urgent trafficking cases from the same time last year. As Cast moved swiftly to adapt its comprehensive programs, one program that could not be virtual was shelter.

Taking precaution even before LA’s Safer at Home order was declared, Cast began moving survivors out of its shelter and into private hotel rooms in order to reduce their exposure to the virus. This ensured that 100% of trafficking survivors who came to Cast had access to safe housing and comprehensive care.

“Never would I have imagined that we would operate our shelter for over a year from a hotel. The pandemic forced us to act fast and reinvent best practices to keep our staff and survivors safe. Thanks to our partnership with the City of Los Angeles, this new shelter gives survivors the opportunity to see past the pandemic and into their futures. It’s transformative,” said Kay Buck, Cast CEO.

Cast will be opening the doors to its new emergency shelter in August. By combining safe housing with trauma-informed services, Cast is ending the cycle of violence and homelesness, and ensuring trafficking survivors have every opportunity to lead independent and fulfilling lives.“We are proud partners to Cast because they have an excellent track record in providing shelter services to survivors of human trafficking. Cast designs shelters that feel like a home where one belongs,” says Abigail Marquez, General Manager of the Los Angeles Community Investment for Families Department.

The California Legislature has passed Cast’s $30 million request to fund human trafficking victim service providers over the next three years. This $30 million will provide emergency funding for survivors of human trafficking amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath to ensure survivors in every part of the state have a place to go for safety, support, and services. 

This additional $30M comes at a time when numbers of urgent human trafficking cases are at an all-time high. The existing $10 million per year of on-going state funding to human trafficking victim service providers is not enough to handle the escalating needs of survivors and their families. Because of this advocacy, the total state budget funding for these programs over the next three years will equal $60 million. This increase will provide more resources to adequately address the needs of survivors in California where human trafficking cases are the highest among any state.  

Since the start of the pandemic, Cast has seen a 455% increase in costs for providing basic necessities and housing in comparison to the same time of year in 2019. Service providers are now facing an unprecedented shortfall of resources with an outsized demand for direct services. This budget request is a direct response to the COVID-19 pandemic that exposed the heightened risk of trafficking exploitation and how the pandemic is impacting survivors who are facing extreme barriers to safety, health services, housing, and employment.

Our work does not end here. Cast provides a collaborative platform to lead groundbreaking policy change, and we need your support more than ever to continue our advocacy for survivors. Join us as a supporter today!

Donate to Cast’s Policy Program

We would like to thank the following champions for leading the fight for state budget funding to support human trafficking survivors and service providers in California. 

Governor Gavin Newsom

Assemblymember Miguel Santiago

Assemblymember Cristina Garcia

Assemblymember Phil Ting

Senator Henry Stern

Senator Maria Elena Durazo

Senator Nancy Skinner

Attorney General Rob Bonta

UNODC Goodwill Ambassador Mira Sorvino

UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Alyssa Milano

Cast Ambassador Kate Bosworth

Cast Ambassador Nicole Scherzinger 

Pro Bono Counsel Cher Gonzalez of Resolute

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The Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking (Cast) is a Los Angeles-based nonprofit organization that is ending human trafficking through education, advocacy, and empowering survivors. We provide comprehensive and transformative services to survivors and their families, and mobilize our coalition partners to advocate for groundbreaking policy and social change. To find out more visit: www.castla.org/human-trafficking/policy/

PRESS CONFERENCE TODAY: The Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking will Join California Attorney General Rob Bonta, Assemblymember Miguel Santiago, and UNICEF Ambassador Alyssa Milano to Discuss the Importance of Budget Funding for Human Trafficking Victim Service Providers 

Los Angeles, California – Kay Buck, CEO for the Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking (Cast) and Angela Guanzon, Survivor Advocate  will be  joining California Attorney General Rob Bonta, Assemblymember Miguel Santiago (D-L.A.) and UNICEF Ambassador and Actor Alyssa Milano for a press conference to announce the inclusion of new funding for human trafficking victim service providers in the California Budget Act of 2021-22, which was passed by the California Legislature this week. This new $30 million funding, spread over the next three years, will provide emergency funding for survivors of human trafficking now and the COVID-19 pandemic aftermath.

This budget request is a direct response to the COVID-19 pandemic that exposed the heightened risk of trafficking exploitation. Victims of human trafficking are facing extreme barriers to safety, health services, housing, and employment. Because of the pandemic, they are in grave danger. Service providers are now facing an unprecedented shortfall when the demand for direct support for human trafficking victims is higher than ever before.

“This budget request has come at a time when human trafficking victims are in crisis. Since the pandemic, Cast has seen a 455% increase in costs for providing basic necessities and housing during the pandemic compared to 2019. We desperately need this emergency budget funding to meet the increasing demand for services and support for human trafficking victims. Together we must ensure human trafficking survivors are not left behind.”  – Cast CEO, Kay Buck

The press conference will begin at 11:00 AM PT / 2:00 PM ET and will be streamed live on the homepage of the California Department of Justice’s website at www.oag.ca.gov.

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The Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking (Cast) is a Los Angeles-based nonprofit organization that is working to put an end to human trafficking through providing comprehensive and life-transforming services to survivors and a platform to advocate for groundbreaking policies and legislative change. Cast is dedicated to enacting and implementing creative approaches to preventing human trafficking and best supporting those impacted at the local, state, and federal levels. To find out more visit: www.castla.org/human-trafficking/policy/

The COVID-19 pandemic has taken a terrible toll on all Californians. While Gov. Gavin Newsom’s recently announced California Comeback Plan allocates billions of emergency aid funding to those hurt by the pandemic, one group hit harder than most has been left out of the budget proposal: human trafficking victims.

I and Assemblymember Miguel Santiago urge Gov. Newsom and the California State Legislature to correct that omission. We call for $10 million in one-time additional funding for human trafficking victim services.

Recently, a woman, Laila (an alias), called the Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking’s (CAST) 24-hour hotline, desperate. She had run away from her sex trafficker, who had always beaten her but now threatened to kill her three children, aged 5, 3 and 2 months. They were hiding out in her car, terrified, with no place to go. Due to the outsized demand for safe housing as a result of COVID-19, CAST’s shelter was full; though they called more than 30 other shelters, none could accept all four of them.

CAST provided services to this brave survivor and her children in her car for a week until they were finally able to secure a room in their emergency shelter hotel. Pondering her situation, Laila said “it shouldn’t be this hard to get into safe housing and to protect my children. They always tell you to leave but they never tell you there might be nowhere to go… You guys (CAST) never gave up on me or my kids and because of that we are going to make it.”

Sadly, Laila’s plight is far from unique.

California is home to several of the most concentrated hubs for labor and sex trafficking in the country. Victims of this heinous crime were made ever more vulnerable by the pandemic, due to the suspension of mechanisms which ordinarily would have uncovered trafficking situations, economic desperation due to job loss, school shutdowns, lockdown and travel restrictions, being quarantined with potential traffickers, housing insecurity, unfair evictions, and shelter scarcity due to social distancing capacity restrictions, closures due to reported COVID-19 infections and lack of funding.

Last summer, Cast saw a 185% spike in urgent human trafficking cases. The sharp rise has prevented massively overburdened service providers from being able to keep up with the increased need. This leads to survivors falling through the cracks, with some re-trafficked, landing right back into a horror show full of violence and trauma in which their life is no longer their own.

The Golden State’s preponderance of trafficking cases is due in part to large runaway and homeless youth populations, proximity to international borders, the number of ports and airports, a significant immigrant population, and industries that attract forced labor and sex trafficking.

For many individuals working in the “informal economy,” (often ineligible for unemployment assistance), pandemic-related income loss and layoffs force them to turn to higher-risk employment situations to meet basic needs or avoid homelessness, increasing their vulnerability to being trafficked.

The one-time funding of $10 million, extremely modest compared to some of the allocations for other groups impacted by the pandemic, would be administered by the Office of Emergency Services and divided among the 21 anti-human trafficking direct service providers across the state. Their immediate, trauma-informed services not only help victims escape their traffickers and prevent them from staying with them longer, but prevent vulnerability to being trafficked or re-trafficked

The human trafficking survivors I have interviewed since 2009 for my ongoing work as Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) for the Global Fight Against Human Trafficking are among the most extraordinary, brave and generous-hearted people I have ever met.

Most, upon exiting a veritable nightmare, make great use of services to rebuild and reclaim their lives, but never turn their backs on their sisters and brothers left behind in the bondage of this growing, hideous crime. Their survivor voices are growing in volume, but the vast majority remain silenced while still victimized – many right here, under our noses, unheard and unseen.

Whether a debt-bonded migrant worker picking vegetables whose family is threatened should he run away, a trans homeless kid being forced to participate in survival sex trafficking, or a woman trafficked here from another country as an unpaid, physically abused nanny, all are worthy of our most vigorous efforts to help ensure their freedom, survival, and potential to thrive.

Please, Gov. Newsom and the state Legislature: Don’t let California turn its back on them in their greatest hour of need.
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Editor’s Note: Academy Award-winning actress Mira Sorvino is a UNODC Goodwill Ambassador for the Global Fight Against Human Trafficking. Assemblymember Miguel Santiago (D-Los Angeles) represents the 53rd District, and leads efforts to fund services for human trafficking survivors.

Together, we can be the community survivors rely on. Join us by making a donation to Cast. Click here to donate.

Long before they were Mayor and First Lady, Eric Garcetti and Amy Elaine Wakeland were simply Amy and Eric, friends of Cast. Along with eleven other couples belonging to Liberty Hill Foundation’s Pobladores Fund, they rallied together to help create community spaces for survivors of human trafficking to develop leadership skills. Now, 17 years later, having achieved extraordinary things together, our partnership with Mayor Garcetti and First Lady Amy Elaine Wakeland is more crucial and ever-growing.

Last year as lockdown mandates were being issued around the county, Mayor Garcetti and City Council President Nury Martinez courageously stepped up with funding that allowed us to move survivors into hotels where they would be safe as part of Project Safe Haven. This allowed us to prevent homelessness of more trafficking survivors, provide housing for survivors together with their families, and place trafficked men in housing who previously would have been placed in general shelters without specialized care and safety measures for trafficking survivors.

The city’s leadership was essential for organizations providing emergency housing across LA, and it inspired a generous $4.2M donation from Rihanna’s Clara Lionel Foundation and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. Cast and our shelter partners immediately put these funds to work keeping survivors and our staff safe even as we saw massive spikes in the daily case count.

We count ourselves lucky to call Los Angeles home with the partnership of our city leaders and donors like you who understand the essential nature of Cast’s mission during a pandemic and its aftermath.

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Together, we can be the community survivors rely on. Join us by making a donation to Cast. Click here to donate.

During the height of the pandemic, Cast received a call from a young mother, Laila, with 3 children ages 5, 3 and 2 months, who were fleeing their trafficker. Cast’s shelter was full and so were the hotel rooms we had allocated for the COVID-19 overflow of survivors needing emergency shelter. Our housing team called over 30 other shelters; none could accept Laila with her children. After a week of providing daily emotional support, basic necessities and safety planning in her car, Cast was able to secure a room in its emergency shelter hotel, where we could quarantine safely and ensure mom and kids had all they needed to rest and heal from this harrowing ordeal.

“It shouldn’t be this hard to get into safe housing and to protect my children. They always tell you to leave but they never tell you there might be nowhere to go…You guys never gave up on me or my kids and because of that we are going to make it.”- Laila, Survivor

For every Laila, there are hundreds more, waiting to escape from their traffickers. Take Zahra and Maria, who were born nearly 10,000 miles apart, in the Philippines and Ethiopia, yet they crossed paths, were trafficked by the same Saudi Princess, and both landed at Cast, supporting one another through a global pandemic.

When the princess took a vacation to Los Angeles, Zahra saw a rare opportunity to escape the horrific abuse she faced, but Maria was too afraid to escape with her. Zahra called our 24-hour hotline and staff brought her to our shelter. She advanced quickly, learning English in under 6 months. She was thrilled when Cast secured a job for her at LAX.

Months later, on a second trip to Los Angeles, Maria summoned the courage to escape with the help of a hotel housekeeper who took her home while they searched online to find Zahra. They reunited and Zahra brought Maria to Cast’s shelter. She had less than a backpack of possessions to her name, and suffered such severe emotional abuse that when staff gave her basic necessities and gift cards to buy clothes, she felt she did not deserve them. She was doing well, but when the shelter in place orders occurred, Maria was retraumatized and put right back into the mindset of being trapped.

Not letting the pandemic halt Maria’s progress, Cast staff supported Maria in getting virtual counseling and her T1 visa, while Zahra served as her mentor. With a new life ahead of her, Maria moved into her own apartment Cast secured for her and will graduate from her medical billing program in a few weeks.   

When our team gets the call, no matter the time of day or the challenges a case might present, Cast’s team and our community of survivors, will be there.

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Together, we can be the community survivors rely on. Join us by making a donation to Cast. Click here to donate.

For Dr. John Jain, Chief Fertility Specialist at the Santa Monica Fertility Clinic, advocating for the rights of others runs in the family. His sister, the late celebrated human rights activist Sunita Jain, has been his inspiration to support Cast.

Dr. Jain takes a humble and entrepreneurial approach to philanthropy. He knows that difficult problems require big, creative solutions, and that no one can solve them alone. That’s why Dr. Jain has centered his foundation around anti-trafficking policy, which supports Cast’s advocacy work through the Sunita Jain Fellowship. By 2025, Cast will create a bridge between practice and policy, where survivors are empowered to work with practitioners to inform a survivor-centered policy agenda. This evolution would be impossible without Dr. Jain’s leadership.

With the support of his Foundation, Cast has built a stronger anti-trafficking movement, including ensuring that almost two dozen other organizations across the state receive funding from the governor’s office.

With Dr. Jain’s support and the partnership of pro-bono government and public relations firms, Resolute and Perry Communications in Sacramento, we are now positioned to make an incredible $10M budget request for these organizations from the state. If approved, these critical funds will help mitigate the lasting impact of COVID-19 on essential programs and services. Dr. Jain is now passing on the family tradition of giving back, as his son Luke helped lead a human trafficking webinar at his high school in partnership with Girl Up. Their dedication is an inspiration to all of us working to end human trafficking, once and for all.

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Together, we can be the community survivors rely on. Join us by making a donation to Cast. Click here to donate.

Emergency Response Case Manager, Alex Mayugba is used to late-night calls. Within 30 minutes of receiving a call, our Emergency Response staff meet victims where they are, no matter the time of day.

When stay-at-home orders, economic instability, and disruption of social services forced survivors into increasingly vulnerable and unsafe conditions, Alex and the Emergency Response team knew they had to quickly pivot to continue meeting the needs of survivors. Now, emergency response is coordinated virtually – from picking up survivors through rideshare apps to providing emotional support and safety planning over the phone. The team leaned on new technology and innovative thinking to rapidly adapt program models, prioritizing the health of staff and clients in the face of massive logistical challenges.

“I appreciate Cast’s recent initiatives to foster a safe and supportive environment for staff and clients belonging to communities that continue to face mistreatment, violence, and injustice – more recently the Black community and now the AAPI community. I have hope that we will continue to stand up for and support our colleagues and clients coming from any and all marginalized groups in times of distress.”

Alex Mayugba, Cast Case Manager

Day in and day out, Alex and her team are called upon to find ways to better support our clients through an equitable, diverse and inclusive lens. This is especially important as clients struggle with very real fears of interacting with law enforcement or potentially becoming the victim of hate-based violence. We stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Black Lives Matter and Stop Asian Hate movements, focusing on how the issues of systemic racism and inequality affect our clients so that we can center justice and belonging in our work. Staff like Alex, who is a strong advocate for preventing violence against the AAPI community, are powerful leaders in this work.

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Together, we can be the community survivors rely on. Join us by making a donation to Cast. Click here to donate.