Live from Music Row Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – official guest host Aaron Gulbransen welcomed the Co-Founder of Mission America Foundation, Aaron Spradlin in studio to discuss their organization’s goals, data on human/child trafficking and alerted Americans to what’s going on in their own backyard.
Gulbransen: We’re going to get more into our conversation with Aaron Spradlin of the Mission America Foundation, who briefly told us what the organization is all about.
So let’s get further on it, because this is one of the preeminent issues, I think of our time which is human and child trafficking.
And you’re an expert on the subject in a little bit. I’m going to ask you, too, since you are a security expert as well. So you clearly care about the individuals and the children and you’re using your expertise to help fight the good fight.
Give us both the big problem in the United States and where it stems from and what’s going on here. So giving you the open floor to talk about the subject because it’s such an important one.
Spradlin: Well, the problem that people in general have is they believe that the world of human trafficking is like the movie Taken. And that’s because of the only example that they’ve really had. And they believe it happens.
It’s in South America, it’s in Central America, it’s in the Middle East, it’s in Europe. Obviously, it’s a massive issue in Ukraine, Moldova, and Romania. It is a massive global issue.
But what they tend to miss is the fact that it’s happening in their backyard. And they want to put a heavy emphasis on the open borders.
And as that is a contributor to the factor to the point where we’re going to have about 150,000 new unaccompanied minors in the United States by the end of the year estimated.
Carmichael: Did you say 150,000? What percentage of that 150,000 is child trafficking? In other words, the people who are bringing those 150,000 children across the border, how many of them are doing it for the sole purpose of child trafficking?
Spradlin: 75 percent.
Carmichael: Wow.
Spradlin: And that’s a major increase. And that is a year that is going to be the end of this year. It went from in fiscal year 20. It went from 18,000 coming across un-accompanied in the fiscal year 2021 to 47,000.
And they’re going to jump that was 163 percent jump. But they’re going to jump to an estimated 150,000 will come across this year.
There’s no ripping from the parents, whether it’s the Trump administration, the Biden administration, Jimmy Carter administrator, it doesn’t matter. They’re not ripping them. They’re being brought here, being paid to be dropped off.
Carmichael: But the increase, I think you said it was 18,000 in 2019, 2020?
Spradlin: It was 18,000. And it went up to 47,000, and now this year it’s 150,000.
Carmichael: So clearly, our public policies in the United States are working are supporting child sex trafficking.
Spradlin: Well look at it.
Carmichael: But you’re not the only one who knows what you just said. So you got that from some official document. And so the people who are in charge of our borders, this is okay with them. Child sex trafficking must be, by definition, okay if in a 24-month period, it jumped from 18,000 to 150,000.
Spradlin: Now, here’s the kicker to that. So I just jumped those numbers. 83 percent of the children trafficked in the United States are United States children. They’re not imported.
Carmichael: So you’re saying it’s closer to a million?
Spradlin: Oh, as far as the total number?
Carmichael: Yes.
Spradlin: They’ll tell you that it’s 365,000. It’s bigger. It’s so much bigger than that. And it’s the fact that we only count the major Metropolitan areas.
So say, for instance, in Tennessee alone, we’re going to look at Memphis and Nashville and Knoxville and Chattanooga as a place.
What that ends up being is a pooling area for runaways that get out into the streets and they have to find something to survive. The predators all understand how this works. They take them in, they get them hooked on the heroin of the crack, whichever.
They get them hooked on a drug that they can’t get out of. And then they will do anything for that drug, but not necessarily for the high, as we’ve learned in our experience, it’s so that they’re not so deathly sick.
So I say that Metropolitan areas, right. Well, from 2016 to 2022, the state of Tennessee, on paper, according to USA Today, is the number one state in America in fighting child trafficking.
That came out USA Today. I think Fox News did something on it, and that was three years in a row. But oddly enough, in that propaganda, I will say they went from 76 counties in the state of Tennessee to report child trafficking under the age of 13 to 95 out of 95 counties reporting child trafficking under the age of 13.
So now you’re not talking about Nashville or Chattanooga or Memphis. You’re talking about Shelbyville, you’re talking about Hohenwald.
You’re talking about in the middle of the rural areas, East Tennessee is covered up in trafficking. And most of it is done by the families of the children.
Carmichael: What does your organization say can be done to address that part of child sex trafficking? How do you identify it and what do you do about it?
Spradlin: Well, there’s a multitude of signs, but let me go to the first part of your question. So what can we do? It costs $1.6 million a year for a dedicated team of law enforcement agents to do this work.
So what I say when I’m in the middle of the conversations we speak on this, especially a lot of GOP organizations throughout the state and the country.
The number one problem is lack of manpower, lack of awareness, and the cost to the law enforcement entities. In order to get ahead of it, you have to bring the awareness piece.
An awareness piece starts in the Capitol. In the early 2000s, we had the threat of an income tax, remember, for the state of Tennessee. And I believe Marsha and Senator Beavers, there was a group that was fighting very hard against that and won.
For more information on Mission America Foundation visit them on the web at missionamericafoundation.com.
Listen to the interview:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
