The nation’s foremost leftist legislators are lending their voice to a new piece of legislation that is being heralded as the “first step” toward legalizing prostitution in America.
The SAFE SEX Workers Study Act, introduced by Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), would toss taxpayer money into an in-depth study on the effects of two anti-sex trafficking bills that became law last year, the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act and the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (SESTA/FOSTA).
The bill is co-sponsored in the House by Rep. Barbara Lee of California and in the Senate by Ron Wyden of Oregon, both Democrats.
Sen. Warren had initially voted for SESTA/FOSTA, but now expresses her concern about the unintended consequence of making consensual prostitution more difficult.
“As lawmakers, we are responsible for examining unintended consequences of all legislation,” Warren said in a statement on Tuesday according to Buzzfeed News. Warren added that her duty to study the law she helped enact “includes any impact [FOSTA-SESTA] may have had on the ability of sex workers to protect themselves from physical or financial abuse.
“Sex workers have relied on such internet platforms to screen clients and negotiate boundaries for consensual, transactional sex services, including condom use and other harm reduction strategies,” Khanna said in a press release on Tuesday. “While SESTA/FOSTA was intended to curb online sex trafficking, by banning the ‘promotion of prostitution,’ a host of internet platforms relied on by sex workers have shut down.”
Today, on the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers, @SenWarren and I are proud to introduce a bill to investigate the unintended consequences of SESTA/FOSTA. This landmark study will be the first of its kind #IDEVASW19 pic.twitter.com/g2tRJYFYjo
— Rep. Ro Khanna (@RepRoKhanna) December 17, 2019
Unsurprisingly, as Fox News reports, the legislation has received support from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chair Pramilia Jayapal, and Rep. Rashida Tlaib.
This is huge: @RepRoKhanna, @RepBarbaraLee, @SenWarren and @RonWyden introduced legislation today to investigate the consequences of SESTA/FOSTA and how it’s harmed sex workers
Original cosponsors include: @AOC @BernieSanders @RashidaTlaib @RepJayapal @janschakowsky and more
— aída chávez (@aidachavez) December 17, 2019
A spokesperson for the top sponsor of SESTA/FOSTA, Ohio Republican Sen. Rob Portman, however, told Fox News that Portman has “no interest in doing a study on how to facilitate any further illegal activity.”
“Passage of SESTA was an important milestone and hard-fought victory for the victims and survivors of online sex trafficking. In this century, in this country, no man, woman, or child should be subjected to sex trafficking,” Portman said in a statement to Fox News. “Thanks to the enactment [of] SESTA, prosecutors can now go after these online traffickers, victims of this abhorrent crime can now have their day in court, and websites that knowingly facilitate sex trafficking are being shut down and being held liable for their actions.”
It will be interesting to see exactly how leftists plan to protect the rights of human trafficking victims sold as sex slaves every single day in America—or if they’ll even bother.
As we see in the transgender “rights” issue, the left almost invariably sides with whichever victim group wields the most power within the social justice camp, regardless of the unintended consequences.
Reach out to your representatives in Congress and urge them not to support this bill!
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