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1 1 (November 21, 2023)

handle is hein.crs/govenok0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Congressional Research Servic informing the legislative debate since 1914 November 21, 2023 Federal Law Enforcement Efforts to Counter Human Smuggling and Human Trafficking Human smuggling and human trafficking crimes continue to be of interest to local, state, and federal policymakers, law enforcement, and others. The federal government responds to both types of crimes in various ways, including using the resources of federal law enforcement agencies. This In Focus discusses the distinction between human smuggling and human trafficking and provides an overview of federal law enforcement efforts to counter human smuggling into and human trafficking within the United States. Dkstingukshing Between H uman Smuggling and H uman Trafficking The term human smuggling is often mistakenly used interchangeably with human trafficking; however, they are distinct concepts. As the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) noted in its 2020 Department of Homeland Security Strategy to Combat Human Trafficking, the Importation of Goods Produced with Forced Labor, and Child Sexual Exploitation, human trafficking does not require crossing a border. Human trafficking victims have been exploited by their trafficker for commercial sex acts or labor. By contrast, human smugglers engage in the crime of bringing people into the United States, or unlawfully transporting and harboring people already in the United States, in deliberate evasion of immigration law. In some situations, human smuggling may result in human trafficking. Some observers have also noted that human smuggling is a crime against the state whereas human trafficking is crime against an individual. And while it can sometimes be challenging to distinguish between the two, particularly in situations where smuggled migrants have later been trafficked, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has highlighted key factors of differentiation: * Consent. Smuggling involves moving individuals who have consented to being smuggled; trafficking involves exploiting individuals who never consented, or if they initially consented, became victimized with the addition of force, fraud, or abuse. * Exploitation. Smuggling ends with the arrival of an individual at their destination; trafficking involves the ongoing exploitation of a victim for profit. * Transnationality. Smuggling involves crossing international borders; trafficking does not need to involve the movement of persons. F ed eral Law Enforcement Response to H uman Smuggling Transnational Organized Crime (TOC) networks generate substantial proceeds (estimates have ranged from the hundreds of millions to billions of dollars) from smuggling migrants into the United States, primarily through smuggling routes along the U.S.-Mexico border. The Biden Administration launched the Counter Human Smuggling campaign-led by DHS-in 2022 to target criminal networks involved in smuggling operations. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Homeland Security Investigations (ICE/HSI), the principal investigative component of DHS, leads federal law enforcement efforts to enforce immigration laws, including human smuggling (also referred to as alien smuggling in statute; 8 U.S.C. §1324) and related offenses. ICE initiated over 2,200 human smuggling investigations in FY2022. Specifically, ICE's Human Smuggling Unit (HSU) works to identify, disrupt, and dismantle criminal travel networks and human smuggling; HSU's Extraterritorial Criminal Travel (ECT) program focuses resources on targeting criminal travel networks that pose threats to national security and public safety. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), also within DHS, is involved in detecting smuggling activity at and between ports of entry. DHS, the Department of Justice (DOJ), and the Department of State collaborate on Operation Sentinel, which seeks to counter smuggling networks in Mexico. DHS and DOJ further coordinate on Joint Task Force Alpha (JTFA), a joint partnership announced in June 2021 to investigate and prosecute criminal smuggling networks operating in Mexico and the Northern Triangle countries of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. DOJ notes that as of the end of FY2022, JTFA had resulted in 120 domestic and 38 international arrests as well as 54 convictions. DOJ's Criminal Division, largely through the Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section, prosecutes federal criminal cases of human smuggling. Data from the U.S. Sentencing Commission indicate that the number of individuals convicted of alien smuggling in federal court generally increased from FY2018 to FY2022. Alien smuggling was the primary charge for 4,056 sentenced offenders in FY2022 compared to 2,843 offenders in FY2018. Of the offenders sentenced in FY2022, 73.8% were U.S. citizens; over half of the cases (52.3%) involved smuggling, transporting, or harboring fewer than six people; and 10.9% of alien smuggling offenses involved an unaccompanied minor.

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