The Current
Advocacy News + Updates
TOP STORY
This spring, advocates across the nation rallied together to speak up for the 40 million people trapped in slavery (Global Slavery Index, 2018). As a movement, thousands of you leveraged the power of digital tools to raise your voices to your members of Congress through tweets, emails and online petitions. Together, we urged Congress to ensure that the State Department’s Program to End Modern Slavery and the Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Office are fully funded in the 2020 appropriations bill. Here is a breakdown of the momentum you’ve built:
In the United States of America, we’ve inaugurated a president only 58 times. 58 January days, each filled with pomp and circumstance, unity and contention, finality and initiation. As Americans, we’ve inaugurated only 45 American presidents. 45 heads of state, commanders in chief, leaders of the free world. Living in Washington, D.C. puts one in proximity to the rare American presidential inauguration, so I had a chance to witness the swearing-in of our 45th President.
By Tim Gehring, IJM Legislative Director
This week, Congress authorized the End Modern Slavery Initiative, which was embedded in the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act—legislation that sets annual national security policy and funding levels for the Department of Defense. IJM was intimately involved in the idea of the End Modern Slavery Initiative and our advocates have been deeply invested in urging Congress to pass and fund this legislation over the past two years.
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. It reminds me to be thankful for the avalanche of blessings I’ve received. This year was no exception.
Though there was much that was wrong and cheap and ignorant in our national conversation this past year, there was so much more that wasn’t.