Democrats Press Marco Rubio to Release Human Trafficking Report

More than two dozen Democratic lawmakers are pressing the State Department to hand over a congressionally mandated report on human trafficking, which is late after Secretary of State Marco Rubio reorganized the department and downsized staff.

“The scourge of human trafficking transcends borders and represents a serious threat to U.S. national security,” the Democratic lawmakers wrote to Rubio on Wednesday, according to a copy of the letter obtained by NOTUS. “The annual report was due to Congress on June 30th; however, as we start the month of September, the Department has yet to release the 2025 Trafficking in Persons Report.”

The Democratic lawmakers, led by Virginia Rep. Don Beyer and including members of the Foreign Affairs Committee and the House Oversight panel, described the Trafficking in Persons report as “a key tool used by law enforcement, foreign governments, and nonprofit organizations in the fight against human trafficking.” They asked the department to explain why it hasn’t given it to Congress yet.

A State Department spokesperson told NOTUS that “human trafficking is an issue which the Trump Administration takes very seriously.”

“It is false to assume that more staff equates to better results,” the spokesperson said when asked about the letter. “During the reorganization meticulous attention was paid to ensure the TIP office could continue to carry out its core functions and statutory requirements including its reports to Congress.”

A State Department website hosting prior versions of the report shows that they have been largely on time over the past decade, either published before the deadline or within a couple of weeks of it.

The Democratic lawmakers raised concerns about personnel cuts, which they believe delayed this year’s report. The Trump administration fired more than 1,300 State Department employees in July, as part of a reorganization of the department that Rubio has argued will streamline its work.

“The Department has long struggled to perform basic diplomatic functions, even as both its size and cost to the American taxpayer has ballooned over the past fifteen years,” Rubio wrote when he announced the changes earlier this year.

Democratic lawmakers said the cuts decimated efforts to combat human trafficking. The State Department office that had focused on combating human trafficking has “been reduced by over 70% due to RIFs and other personnel policy changes,” according to the lawmakers’ letter.

Most of the people responsible for the Trafficking in Persons Report “were abolished on July 11,” the Democrats wrote.

The staff reductions affected “every anti-trafficking expert responsible for China, North Korea, and Russia, all of which are state sponsors of human trafficking and adversaries of U.S. foreign policy,” the lawmakers said.

For more than 20 years, the annual Trafficking in Persons reports have provided members of Congress with detailed information about how to fight human trafficking around the globe.

“It ensures that U.S. foreign assistance does not benefit governments that are not making sufficient efforts to prosecute human traffickers, protect human trafficking victims, and prevent human trafficking crimes,” the lawmakers wrote in their letter.

This article has been updated with a comment from the State Department.