Sens. Blackburn, Grassley introduce bill to protect migrant children from trafficking at the border

GOP Sens. Chuck Grassley and Marsha Blackburn on Tuesday introduced legislation to protect migrant children at the southern U.S. border from human trafficking.

“Over the last four years, child exploitation at our nation’s southern border has exploded," Grassley, of Iowa, said in a statement. "This humanitarian crisis is a direct result of the Biden administration’s open border policies."

The legislation is titled the :The Preventing the Recycling of Immigrants is Necessary for Trafficking Suspension" or the "PRINTS Act."

According to the lawmakers, the legislation would authorize noncitizens under 14 to be fingerprinted, increase security measures and mandate that the Department of Homeland Security give reports about apprehended traffickers who pretended to be related to minors.

"Empowering border patrol agents to fingerprint non-citizens under the age of 14 would give them the tools they need to identify victims of child recycling and stop this abuse in its tracks," said Blackburn, of Tennessee.

“Recycled” children are identified by Immigration and Customs Enforcement as minors who were used by traffickers who posed as family members to bring them across the border.

Iowa GOP Sen. Joni Ernst says one child was brought across the border eight different times in 2019.