Cindy McCain calls for human trafficking crackdown
Aug 14, 2013, 12:36 PM | Updated: 12:36 pm
PHOENIX — The wife of Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is calling on the state legislature to pass tougher laws against human trafficking.
Cindy McCain wants the state to have new laws in place when it hosts the Super Bowl in 2015.
“The Super Bowl, as all of you know, is one of the world’s largest human trafficking centers when it goes on in the world,” McCain said Wednesday.
The anti-slavery Polaris Project gave Arizona a “needs improvement” grade when it comes to dealing with human trafficking.
The Polaris Project used a four-tiered system to rate states for their effectiveness in dealing with human trafficking. States doing an excellent job were placed in Tier One. Tier Two was a “good” job. Tier Three “needs improvement” and Tier Four was “failure.”
“Unfortunately, Arizona is only a Tier Three state right now,” McCain said. “But we are working very, very hard to make sure that Arizona becomes a Tier One state before our big event, which is the Super Bowl in 2015.”
McCain said that she’s confident that Gov. Jan Brewer will lead the state to adopting the tougher laws before the big game.
In 2011, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott called the Super Bowl “the single largest human trafficking incident in the United States.” The large number of fans leads to an increase in prostitution.
Forbes reported that 10,000 prostitutes were brought to Miami for the 2010 Super Bowl. There were 133 prostitution arrests in Dallas during the 2011 Super Bowl.
