Human Trafficking Research Lab @Millikin

Last night we hosted our Ninth Annual Human Trafficking Prevention Month panel discussion on Labor Trafficking at Millikin! We had a great discussion from a variety of perspectives on an understudied aspect of human trafficking. Our local expert panel comprised of Jane Flanagan (Director, Illinois Department of Labor, attorney), Romina Hendrzak (Regional Coordinator, Anti I-Trafficking Services U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants), Katrina Quillen (Supervising Attorney, Legal Aid Society of Metropolitan Family Services), and Salem Starr (Human Trafficking Survivor Advocate) were an amazing group.  We discussed how labor trafficking manifests in our region. While most of the victims and survivors of labor trafficking in the United States are foreign born victims trafficked to the United States from other countries. However, we also do increasingly see intersections with sex and labor trafficking where people are exploited in various ways including forced criminality where tra...

My student research assistant Cassidy was sick so I had to brave it alone on WSOY Byers & Co this morning to talk about our panel discussion tonight on labor trafficking at Millikin as part of Human Trafficking Prevention Month. I definitely was not prepared to talk about the weather and who I am going to cheer for in the Superbowl but you can listen in to hear me attempt to talk about sports! The focus of the interview was our highlighting our panel discussion and research in the lab and you can listen at the link below.  

  Last year at our Global Slavery Summit at Millikin we had an advocacy table with postcards to Representatives Mary Miller and Nikki Budzinski asking for their vote on HB 4323 Trafficking Survivors Relief Act (TSRA). This bill would help survivors clear their criminal record for federal crimes and hopefully create a pathway for the states who do not have something similar to do the same so that a vacatur clause is available across the US on numerous levels of governance. Having a criminal record from their exploitation is the one of the large impediments survivors face after their victimization limiting their access to employment and housing. Advocacy for this bill has been ongoing for the past ten years and it was reintroduced during the 119th Congress. It passed through the House of Representatives and the Senate in December 2025 and was signed into law on January 23, 2026. The house suspended the rules to adopt the bill so we can't see how they voted but we hope that our postca...

One easy way to raise awareness during Human Trafficking Prevention Month is reading a proclamation at the city council meeting. I have been doing this with students since 2019 and it has been a great opportunity to meet city officials and spend a moment during the public meeting to recognize human trafficking in our community. We were able to go to the Decatur City Council meeting again this year with my student research assistant Cassidy. She got to shake hands with the mayor and get her signature on proclamation. It was pretty easy to set up via a colleague on the council and there were lots of models to look at for inspiration online if you would like to set this up in your own community! 

Human Trafficking Prevention Month is always an interesting time to learn more about the topic and this year there are several webinars which are free to attend and related to policy advocacy or data. Today, I attended a discussion on "2026 Federal Human Trafficking Policy Priorities: Let the Data Speak" sponsored by Polaris and Allies Against Slavery focused on three key federal bills: Trafficking Survivors Relief Act, Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, and the National Human Trafficking Database Act. It was interesting to learn more about the policy gaps in prosecution, services, and national coordination especially in data compilation on the federal level. We received legislative summaries for all of the bills and advocacy talking points with the key goals of the bills. I was most interested in learning about Florida's SB 7064 adopted in 2023, which created a Statewide Data Repository for Anonymous Human Trafficking Data at the University of South Flor...

Right before the holidays began I had a chance to be interviewed by WCIA news about our research on human trafficking in the lab. I spoke about our adjudication research and where we have noticed increases in labor trafficking in Central Illinois. I am always thankful to share our research and knowledge with local audiences and help raise awareness to the types of trafficking we see in our region especially as more people are traveling for the holidays. You can read and watch the short segment here !

This past semester, I have enjoyed the opportunity to work at Millikin's Human Trafficking Research Lab. During my time here, I have connected with professionals from several different fields and been introduced to an intricate web of individuals dedicated to fighting human trafficking. One of my favorite opportunities has been taking minutes for meetings of the Illinois Human Trafficking Task Force and witnessing their activism in action.  Currently, we are working on a research project that seeks to link media portrayals of trafficking victims to successful human trafficking legislation, or lack thereof. I have extensively researched and written up narratives on the human trafficking-related laws in Missouri and Illinois as the groundwork of the project. Next, we will compile newspapers from each of these states and compare the language used to portray victims of human trafficking with the state’s legislation. Then, we will determine whether or not the media has influenced the pa...