Obama Recommits to Ending Human Trafficking in 2010

This week, in honor of January as National Human Trafficking Prevention Month, and because January 11 is National Human Trafficking Awareness Day, President Obama voiced his recommitment to ending human trafficking. He also issued a call to action to the citizens of the United States and the world to provide safe havens to victims and prosecute traffickers. Is President Obama's leadership what we need to finally abolish slavery in the coming decade?

Thus far, Obama has indicated both verbally and by cabinet appointments that he will be a president who recognizes the seriousness of human trafficking and who is willing to take action against it. As he said in his speech this week, despite the fact that the "dim years of chattel slavery in the United States [were] ended by President Abraham Lincoln's actions and the Civil War, the darkness and inhumanity of enslavement exists."

Obama has been often compared to Lincoln -- both men from Illinois, reformers, and representing a huge step forward in the civil rights of African Americans. It's a comparison Obama has embraced and even encouraged. Does this mean he is ready and willing to take up the mantle of abolition which Lincoln found hoisted upon him in the civil war? Does it mean he plans to continue in those great footsteps, doing even more than Lincoln to bring an end to not just legal slavery, but all slavery?

My greatest hope in Obama's potential to be the president who ends human trafficking is his ability to garner the respect of others, especially leaders of foreign nations. While it is crucial that we in the U.S. address the significant human trafficking problem here at home, we are just one of many countries struggling to fight slavery. And other countries around the world like India, Brazil, and places in Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe, are struggling to fight a bigger problem with fewer resources. I believe that Obama can help give countries who have the political will to fight trafficking the resources to do so. But even more important, I believe he has the ability to give countries who don't have the political will the inspiration to change. Obama has tried hard to set his foreign policy strategy up as very different from his predecessor, and my hope is that by setting an example at home and extending a hand of diplomacy, Obama can inspire other countries to action against modern-day slavery.

So thank you, President Obama, for recommitting yourself and the U.S. to fighting human trafficking in the coming decade.

Photo credit: ex magician