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BY BLAKE HANSON
You're watching multisource US video news analysis from Newsy.
Dark and foreboding TV ads-- created by the U.S. government.
VICTIM: “I didn’t leave my country for this”
CAPTORS: “Yes”
VICTIM: “But I paid you!”
(Crying)
CAPTORS: “Show that pretty smile.”
It’s all part of an anti-human trafficking ad campaign with the theme “No Te Enganes -- Don't Be Fooled.”
The U.S. ads have been running in Mexico and Central America. Now, similar ads will air in Florida, Georgia, and the D.C. metro area. They feature the number of a hotline to report suspicious activity. The hotline director tells CNN...
"’Since we've started doing the hotline in 2007, we've taken over 34,000 calls and believe we've learned (of) ... over 4,000 potential victims of trafficking...’"
A U.S. border official tells Arizona’s KNXV, human trafficking isn’t just a small problem.
"’Death, disappearance, and enslavement, these too often are the futures that await illegal immigrants who mortgage their lives to human smugglers...’”
That same border patrol official explains to other media outlets-- the problem all ties back to drug cartels.
“Human trafficking is often perpetrated by drug cartels...and the 257,000 illegal border crossings every year present a tremendous risk of exploitation or death of immigrants at the hands of smugglers.”
Transcript by Newsy.
