I 
114TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION 
H. R. 611 
To amend the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 relating to deter-
minations with respect to efforts of foreign countries to reduce demand 
for commercial sex acts under the minimum standards for the elimination 
of trafficking. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JANUARY 28, 2015 
Mr. HULTGREN (for himself, Mr. SMITH of New Jersey, Mr. JOHNSON of 
Ohio, Mr. WALBERG, Mr. PITTS, Mr. RIBBLE, and Mrs. HARTZLER) in-
troduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on For-
eign Affairs 
A BILL 
To amend the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 
relating to determinations with respect to efforts of for-
eign countries to reduce demand for commercial sex acts 
under the minimum standards for the elimination of 
trafficking. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Sex Trafficking De-
mand Reduction Act’’. 
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SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 
Congress finds the following: 
(1) It has been the longstanding position of the 
United States to reduce the demand for sex traf-
ficking victims. There is also a wide international 
consensus on the necessity of demand reduction in 
order to prevent human trafficking. 
(2) The United Nations Protocol to Prevent, 
Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Espe-
cially Women and Children, Supplementing the 
United Nations Convention Against Transnational 
Organized Crime of 2000 (also referred to as the 
‘‘Palermo Protocol(s)’’) expressly addresses the re-
quirement that nations make serious efforts to re-
duce demand for trafficked persons. 
(3) Article nine, addressing prevention of 
human trafficking specifically directs that, ‘‘States 
Parties shall adopt or strengthen legislative or other 
measures, such as educational, social or cultural 
measures, including through bilateral and multilat-
eral cooperation, to discourage the demand that fos-
ters all forms of exploitation of persons, especially 
women and children, that leads to trafficking.’’. 
(4) The United Nations Protocol, the Europe 
Convention on Action against Human Trafficking, 
and the 2011 European Union Directive of the Eu-
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ropean Parliament and the Council on preventing 
and combating trafficking in human beings, also 
specifically address the need to prevent human traf-
ficking by reducing demand for trafficking victims. 
(5) Research has shown that legal prostitution 
increases the demand for prostituted persons and 
thus increases the market for sex. As a result, there 
is a significant increase in instances of human traf-
ficking. 
(6) In 2012 researchers Seo-Young Cho, Axel 
Dreher, and Eric Neumayer published their findings 
that demonstrated ‘‘the scale effect of legalizing 
prostitution leads to an expansion of the prostitution 
market and thus an increase in human trafficking, 
while the substitution effect reduces demand for 
trafficked prostitutes by favoring prostitutes who 
have legal residence in a country’’. 
(7) In 2005 Di Nicola and others provided de-
scriptive statistics focusing on 11 European Union 
countries. According to their results, stricter pros-
titution laws are correlated with reduced flows of 
human trafficking. 
(8) Researchers Niklas Jakobsson and Andreas 
Kotsadam found a casual link between legal pros-
titution 
and 
increases 
in 
human 
trafficking. 
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Jakobsson and Kotsadam found that trafficking of 
persons for commercial sexual exploitation is least 
prevalent in countries where prostitution is illegal 
and most prevalent in countries where prostitution is 
legalized. 
(9) Further data has demonstrated the correla-
tion between the adoption of legislation that crim-
inalizes demand and reductions in sex trafficking 
victims. 
SEC. 3. AMENDMENT RELATING TO DETERMINATIONS 
WITH RESPECT TO EFFORTS OF FOREIGN 
COUNTRIES TO REDUCE DEMAND FOR COM-
MERCIAL SEX ACTS UNDER THE MINIMUM 
STANDARDS FOR THE ELIMINATION OF TRAF-
FICKING. 
(a) IN GENERAL.—Section 108 of the Trafficking 
Victims Protection Act of 2000 (22 U.S.C. 7106) is 
amended by adding at the end the following new sub-
section: 
‘‘(c) CRITERIA WITH RESPECT TO COMMERCIAL SEX 
ACTS.—In determinations under subsection (b)(12)(A), if 
the government of the country has the authority to pro-
hibit the purchase of commercial sex acts and fails to do 
so, such failure to prohibit the purchase of commercial sex 
acts shall be deemed to be a failure on the part of the 
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government to make serious and sustained efforts to re-
duce the demand for commercial sex acts, notwithstanding 
other efforts made by the government to reduce the de-
mand for commercial sex acts.’’. 
(b) EFFECTIVE DATE.—The amendment made by 
subsection (a) takes effect on the date of the enactment 
of this Act and applies with respect to determinations 
under subsection (b)(12)(A) of section 108 of the Traf-
ficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 that are made on 
or after such date of enactment. 
Æ 
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