The most important takeaway from last week’s publication of the 2025 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report isn’t what’s inside the document, but the circumstances of its release. The future of the report itself is in peril, as is the office that produces it.
2025 TIP report release
The TIP Report is the world’s premiere reference resource on forced labor and sex trafficking, evaluating anti-trafficking efforts by more than 150 governments and providing concrete recommendations for improvement. For decades, the State Department has gathered diplomats from foreign countries, survivors of human trafficking, members of Congress, religious leaders, journalists and civil society experts from around the world to annual TIP Report launch events. The convenings, typically headlined by the Secretary of State, are more than routine Washington protocol. They underscore the importance of the report’s findings to drive improvements in anti-trafficking efforts worldwide, to demonstrate the US government’s commitment to combat trafficking and lead the way among nations, and to coalesce whole-of-society partnerships necessary for success.
This year, however, after missing the statutory deadline to release the report by three months, the department quietly put it online with no launch event and little public notice a day before the government shut down. The report did not elevate the issue’s importance to US diplomacy by providing a formal introduction by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has championed anti-trafficking efforts for years while in Congress.[1] The annual TIP Heroes Program, which spotlights frontline global leaders, many of them survivors, was missing from the report. A section on the impact of trafficking on the LGBTQ+ community was dropped. The report did not mention in its analysis of the United States that there have been significant reductions in anti-trafficking programs at key federal agencies.[2] This context for the report’s release has undermined US leadership in the global fight to combat trafficking and tarnished the TIP Report’s reputation and credibility.
25 years of progress at risk
This year marks the 25th anniversary of the landmark legislation[3] that created the TIP Report and launched America’s comprehensive anti-trafficking effort. The 2025 report’s theme centered on a quarter-century of progress and challenges that lie ahead.
One of those challenges will be the capacity of the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons (TIP Office) to produce a quality report next year and beyond. Staff at the TIP Office was dramatically reduced after the 2025 report’s completion this spring, including many experts who craft the report itself and evaluate options for the president to impose sanctions on Tier 3 countries that are underperforming.
Another challenge may be the capacity of the TIP Office to continue frontline programs in trafficking hotspots around the world. Funding for the office’s grantmaking portfolio is in doubt, while funding for anti-trafficking grantmaking in the US Agency for International Development and the Labor Department’s Bureau of International Labor Affairs has been eliminated. International anti-trafficking programs are vital because they protect American companies and workers from unfair price competition by other countries where forced labor occurs in mining, farming, fishing, manufacturing and other businesses. Internationally-focused programs also help safeguard America’s homeland by thwarting the use of human trafficking by transnational criminal enterprises and terrorist organizations.
2025 US tier ranking
The 2025 report ranks the United States as a Tier 1 country that meets minimum standards to prevent trafficking, prosecute perpetrators and protect victims and survivors. Maintaining this ranking moving forward is in jeopardy. While the report highlights important progress in the US in a number of areas, it also notes significant shortcomings:
“There was a decrease in federal human trafficking prosecutions and a significant decrease in federal convictions of human traffickers. Support for victim services remained inadequate, as did the availability of affordable, safe, and stable housing options for survivors. The government continued not to mandate human trafficking screening for all individuals in immigration detention or custody.”
The report spotlights other deficiencies in the US, including observations provided by ATEST to the TIP research team as they conducted their analysis. Despite these shortcomings, the US is reducing staffing and funding at key anti-trafficking offices and has allowed portions of its key anti-trafficking law to lapse. Whether the U.S. will belong on Tier 1 next year is an open question
Important 2025 TIP report strengths
ATEST applauds the 2025 report’s sections on forced labor and international trade enforcement mechanisms to block tainted products from entering the US market. This highlights a critical recognition that forced labor anywhere is a threat to fair labor everywhere.
ATEST also applauds the section about the use of forced labor in international online scam operations that target Americans. This highlights that U.S. activities against trafficking must not end at our borders; we must take the battle to the frontlines.[4]
ATEST also welcomes the report’s recognition that not all traffickers are private businesses or individual criminals. In many parts of the world, governments themselves are complicit.
Needed action
ATEST’s September letter to Congress identified four key priorities for immediate action. Urging the administration to release the TIP Report was one. But three vital steps remain: 1) Reauthorize portions of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act that have lapsed;[5] 2) Safeguard anti-trafficking programs in FY26 by appropriating not less than FY24/25 levels of funding; and, 3) formally integrate anti-trafficking policies into the State Department’s reauthorization.[6] [7]
The 25th anniversary of the TVPA’s enactment is October 28. Even with a government shutdown, bipartisan Congressional action to reaffirm America’s commitment to combat forced labor and sex trafficking is possible. A 25th anniversary would be a terrible opportunity to waste.
About ATEST
The Alliance to End Slavery and Trafficking (ATEST) is a US-based nonpartisan coalition that advocates for solutions to prevent and end all forms of human trafficking and forced labor inside the U.S. and around the world. We promote lasting solutions to prevent labor and sex trafficking, hold perpetrators accountable, ensure justice for victims and empower survivors with tools for recovery. Our collective experience implementing programs in more than 30 US cities and 100 countries gives us unparalleled breadth and depth of expertise. For the past 16 years, ATEST has served as a trusted adviser to presidential administrations and members of Congress. www.endslaveryandtrafficking.org.
[1] A three-sentence standalone statement in Secretary Rubio’s name was posted online elsewhere by the State Dept. press office
[2] The 2025 TIP report covers activities from April 1, 2024 through March 31, 2025. Many of the freezes and reductions in U.S. anti-trafficking policies and programs began before this cutoff deadline, and expanded afterward.
[3] PL 106-386, Trafficking Victims Protection Act
[4] See also S. 2950, The proposed Scam Compound Accountability and Mobilization (SCAM) Act
[5] H.R. 1144 has passed the House Foreign Affairs Committee and awaits floor action; S.2647 has been included as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (S.Amdt.3608 to S.2296, Section 5641)
[6] Protecting America’s Economic Prosperity and National Security by Combating Human Trafficking Abroad
[7] H.R. 5247, which includes this provision, has passed the House Foreign Affairs Committee and awaits floor action
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