A post from Marian Hatcher

Shared Hope International’s Report Cards are designed not merely to evaluate state laws, but to serve as an advocacy roadmap for lawmakers seeking to strengthen their state’s response to trafficking. By clearly identifying gaps, elevating best practices, and pairing grades with technical assistance, the Report Cards help states understand how to improve—not just where they fall short.

Illinois offers a powerful case study of how this tool is intended to be used. Its journey—from early leadership, to setbacks under an updated survivor-centered framework, and ultimately to comprehensive reform—demonstrates how policymakers can leverage the Report Cards to improve both their grade and, more importantly, outcomes for trafficked children and youth.

History of the Report Cards Project

In 2011, the Protect Innocence Challenge (PIC) project was launched in response to a critical gap: many states did not have a criminal law against child sex trafficking. This gap made it difficult to identify victims, hold offenders accountable, or build effective systems of protection.

In response, Shared Hope began sustained advocacy to strengthen state laws and improve protections for survivors. The earliest Report Cards reflected the reality of the time—most states received failing grades.

This work required more than statutory reform. It demanded a shift in cultural attitudes and stronger collaboration across systems. By supporting state legislators and engaging partners in law enforcement, child welfare, and survivor advocacy, Shared Hope helped expose gaps in existing laws and advance survivor-centered policies. This approach fostered shared responsibility and laid the foundation for more protective legal frameworks.

The impact was significant. By 2019, no state received an “F,” and most earned grades of “A” or “B,” signaling a nationwide shift in how child sex trafficking was understood and addressed.

Building on this progress, Shared Hope introduced the Report Cards on Child and Youth Sex Trafficking, an advanced legislative framework that reflected a deeper evolution in state policy—placing greater emphasis on victim protections and trauma-informed, survivor-centered responses.

In October 2025, Shared Hope launched the Just Like Me Report Card, a natural outgrowth of this work and a reflection of the organization’s commitment to ending the unjust criminalization of trafficking survivors. Grounded in years of research, collaboration, and legislative advocacy, the Just Like Me Campaign aims to stop the ongoing injustice of criminalizing survivors.

Designed as an accessible advocacy tool, the Just Like Me Report Cards provide a clear snapshot of where each state’s laws stand across ten key priorities. A companion Policymakers’ Guide offers detailed statutory analysis of 37 areas of law, along with state-specific recommendations to strengthen protections and advance reform. Together, these resources equip policymakers with actionable guidance to craft law and policy that ensure all survivors are recognized, supported, and protected.

Report Cards in Action: Illinois Case Study

Illinois was an early leader in responding to child sex trafficking. In 2010, it became the first state in the country to enact a Safe Harbor law—the Illinois Safe Children’s Act—designed to divert child trafficking victims from the criminal legal system into services. This landmark legislation helped establish Illinois as a model for survivor-centered policy and contributed to the state earning a “B” on Shared Hope’s 2019 Report Card, reflecting strong legislative efforts related to domestic minor sex trafficking, demand reduction, trafficker accountability, and investigative tools.

During my tenure prior to retirement from the Cook County Sheriff’s Office, I was deeply involved in statewide and local collaborations reflected in Report Card periods from 2011 through 2019, including work across child welfare and law enforcement systems. While Illinois’s early leadership was significant, implementation challenges soon emerged. Insufficient oversight, delayed appropriations, leadership turnover, and an overburdened child welfare system at the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services limited the Safe Harbor law’s effectiveness and strained statewide coordination.

Over time, these growing pains gave way to increased awareness, advocacy, and collaboration across agencies. Still, when Illinois’s grade fell from a “B” to an “F” under the advanced Report Cards on Child and Youth Sex Trafficking, the shift prompted swift public scrutiny—demonstrating the accountability power of the Report Cards and underscoring the need for system-level reform.

In response, I began liaising, in my role as a Shared Hope International policy consultant, with the statewide joint task force co-chaired by the Illinois State Police. Alongside Sidney McCoy, Shared Hope’s Director of Advocacy, we provided technical assistance and a Report Card briefing to the task force. Encouragingly, state leaders were already working to address gaps in coordination and pursuing legislative reforms to strengthen Illinois’s juvenile trafficking response. Shared Hope’s role was to help align those efforts with the Report Card framework and refine remaining areas in need of reform.

These efforts—along with the sustained advocacy of survivor leaders and partner organizations across Illinois—culminated in the passage of the Illinois Statewide Trauma-Informed Response to Human Trafficking Act. With this comprehensive, coordinated, and survivor-centered legislation in place, Illinois’s grade rose from an “F” to an “A.”

“Illinois is now among the leading states in the fight against human trafficking, and this new ‘A’ ranking from Shared Hope International represents my administration’s enduring commitment to keeping all Illinoisans safe,” said Governor JB Pritzker. “This year, I proudly signed pivotal legislation that established a coordinated, multi-agency effort to better support survivors of human trafficking.”

“This progress reflects the power of community—survivors, advocates, and public servants coming together to build systems rooted in dignity and care,” said Dulce M. Quintero, Secretary of the Illinois Department of Human Services and Joint Human Trafficking Working Group Co-Chair. “This Act strengthens our shared capacity to respond with humanity and purpose.”

Conclusion

Illinois’s journey—from early leadership, through implementation challenges, to renewed reform—illustrates exactly how Shared Hope’s Report Cards are intended to function: as a constructive advocacy tool that identifies gaps, sparks accountability, and supports lawmakers in building stronger, survivor-centered systems. Grades are not an endpoint; they are a catalyst for collaboration, technical assistance, and progress.

When policymakers engage with the Report Cards as a roadmap rather than a ranking, real change is possible. Illinois’s transformation from an “F” to an “A” demonstrates that with political will, coordinated systems, and trauma-informed policy, states can meaningfully improve their response to child and youth sex trafficking—and better protect those most at risk.

Dr. Marian Hatcher
Shared Hope Policy Consultant
Ambassador-at-Large, United Nations

Each January we start off the new year with renewed vigor to fight human trafficking as we acknowledge and consider the long road ahead during National Human Trafficking Prevention month. Of course, we know we can’t address Human Trafficking in one month, and the reality is that human trafficking cuts across so many different issue areas that most months have some relevance to this fight, and offer a different perspective on the issue as we move through the year. However, as we move through February, there is a unique importance to pause and consider the impact of Black History month on human trafficking. Sadly, the data continues to show that trafficking disproportionately impacts Black communities, especially Black children and youth, largely due to structural inequality.

“These vulnerabilities do not exist “because of racial identity but because of deeply entrenched systemic practices and structural responses to race, ethnicity, and socio-economic status.” Thus, many of the factors that increase Black girls’ risk of being trafficked also make them more likely to be criminalized as a result of their trafficking victimization and directed into the justice system. The disproportionate arrests of both exploited Black girls and women, is glaring.”

Currently, there are two federal bills that exemplify the need for shifting the trajectory that puts at-risk youth in the crosshairs of abuse and exploitation while also addressing the resulting harms when our systems failed to shift that trajectory and those young people not only experience trafficking, but also find themselves facing the immense burden of a criminal conviction. We must view juvenile justice packages of legislation as well as long term consequence legislation as intertwined opportunities, which serve as building blocks for more just responses overall.

It is imperative we connect the dots, no longer passing legislation in silos, but instead realizing the problems and their solutions are a part of a puzzle. Vulnerabilities resulting from being a runaway can lead to homelessness for our young people, which in many situations results in trafficking. Circumstances such as this will become an environment where criminal behavior becomes an act of survival to meet a trafficker’s demands or to meet basic needs such as food and shelter.

This is why the Runaway and Homeless Youth and Trafficking Prevention Act (RHYTPA) is so critically important. As the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act celebrates its 50^th anniversary, this bill would reauthorize and expand the critically important programs that enable RHY providers to be the force that shifts the trajectory for young people facing homelessness and housing insecurity. Recognizing that these adversities don’t simply dissipate on a young person’s 18^th birthday (indeed these adversities are often compounded as that young person ages out of supports provided through child serving systems), RHY programs extend critically needed supports to youth 18+ and can be a lifeline at a critically important stage of a young person’s life.

If we don’t address the vulnerabilities and systemic failures aimed at our younger population, we will be addressing the same issues when they become adults. Tragically, as a survivor-leader and anti-trafficking advocate, I have seen the failure to support young people early on play out day after day. I have seen how failing to shift the trajectory early on, leads to greater harms and often unjust involvement in the criminal justice system. Then that involvement in the criminal justice system compounds the trauma of that experience by leaving survivors with a criminal record that impedes access to housing, education, even basic financial resources that are needed to move forward, requiring a different, but equally important, type of legislative remedy to address the injustice of criminalization that arises from victimization.

The Trafficking Survivors Relief Act (TSRA) provides that remedy at the federal level. This bill is essential to (1) provide criminalized survivors of trafficking the opportunity to address unjust criminalization at the outset of a prosecution by asserting an affirmative defense, (2) remove convictions and arrests resulting from trafficking and enable trafficking survivors to shed the incredible burden of carrying an unjust federal conviction and criminal history, and (3) ensure that this remedy is available to a wide range of survivors.

“Victim-Offender Intersectionality (VOI) is at the heart of the Trafficking Survivors Relief Act (TSRA). It is the solution to unjust criminalization when addressing vulnerabilities, years of exploitation, and long-term consequences. Consequences impacting a survivor’s ability to secure safe housing, employment, education and financial stability.

As a member of the SHI Just Response Council, a survivor leader, who received Executive Clemency & Expungement on the state level in Illinois, I have agonized over the substance of this legislation. It is therefore my deep belief in the need for a federal remedy to alleviate long lasting legal effects on survivors, that I support Affirmative Defense and Vacatur.” (Rev. Dr. Marian Hatcher, January 31, 2024).

When we don’t connect the dots between runaway and homeless youth, trafficking, and juvenile and adult criminal justice in a uniform manner, we inevitably find ourselves addressing the lack of viable solutions to harm after the fact. Trying to fit the individual pieces of a puzzle together can be challenging and sometimes discouraging, but the victory in completing the puzzle is always of great reward! We must end the cycle of harm and take action to prevent all the harms of trafficking, right from the beginning by protecting young people, and down the road to prevent trafficking victimization from being the end of the road.