ATEST: Alliance to End Slavery & Trafficking (USA)
Legislation to strengthen regulation of foreign labor recruiters is an essential element in the prevention of human trafficking and forced labor. Labor recruiters are often complicit or directly involved in the trafficking of workers, exploiting U.S. nonimmigrant visa programs. These recruiters, who operate in a climate of impunity, lure impoverished and desperate foreign workers to the United States, promising jobs described as plentiful and lucrative. They rely on coercive tactics, charging guestworkers exorbitant illegal fees that often force the workers to stay in abusive or exploitative working conditions under debt bondage or other forms of slavery.