{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://mace.house.gov/media/press-releases/congresswoman-nancy-mace-opens-hearing-technology-combat-human-trafficking", "Congresswoman Nancy Mace Opens Hearing On Technology To Combat Human Trafficking; Slams Attorney General Alan Wilson\u2019s Failure To Act", "2025-12-15", "2025", "2025-12", "Republican", "House", "SC", "Nancy Mace", "M000194", "mace.house.gov", "mace", "https://mace.house.gov/media/press-releases", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. (Dec. 15, 2025) \u2014 Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation Chairwoman Nancy Mace opened a congressional hearing on modern technological tools to combat human trafficking, while sharply criticizing South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson for presiding over skyrocketing trafficking rates and failing to prosecute offenders.\n\nIn her opening remarks, Chairwoman Mace underscored Wilson\u2019s alarming record, noting reports showing a more than 400 percent increase in human trafficking under his 16-year tenure and zero prosecutions of pedophile cases last year. Mace emphasized while state leaders like Wilson have failed to act, Congress must embrace innovative law enforcement technologies and update outdated systems to protect victims and hold traffickers accountable.\n\nThe hearing, titled \u201cUsing Modern Tools to Counter Human Trafficking,\u201d examined how artificial intelligence, digital forensics, and advanced data analytics can help law enforcement identify trafficking networks, rescue victims faster, and build stronger cases against predators.\n\nWATCH Subcommittee Chairwoman Mace\u2019s opening remarks:\n\nhttps://youtu.be/Ir5W2KtugG4\n\nBelow are Subcommittee Chairwoman Mace\u2019s opening remarks:\n\nGood afternoon.\n\nThank you all for being here today for this important hearing on using technology to counter human trafficking.\n\nHuman trafficking is not an abstract crime. It is happening right now, everywhere\u2014on the phones in our teenagers\u2019 pockets, on the websites we scroll past without thinking, and in the hotel rooms just off the interstates which run through all of our districts all across the country.\n\nThe average age a victim is first trafficked in the United States could be as low as twelve to fourteen years old.\n\nLet that sink in. When you look at the Epstein victims for example, they were 14, many of them.\n\nWhile we\u2019re sitting here, children are being bought and sold online like commodities.\n\nThese websites and communications platforms allowed traffickers to operate in unimaginable ways.\n\nBut\u2014and this is why we are here today\u2014technology also provides us with a huge opportunity to fight this terrible crime with 21st-century tools.\n\nArtificial intelligence, data analytics, and digital forensics are no longer science fiction. They are recovering victims in hours instead of months, identifying networks once hidden in plain sight, and building courtroom-ready cases against predators who thought the internet made them untouchable.\n\nBut here\u2019s the hard truth: we\u2019re still fighting this fight with one hand tied behind our backs.\n\nLaw enforcement is drowning in more than twenty million Cyber Tipline reports a year while task forces are understaffed and underfunded and sometimes stuck using tools that were considered cutting-edge 20 years ago.\n\nTech companies are generating mountains of raw data, requiring increased resources to sort through it all. And well-meaning initiatives with the best intentions have, in some cases, driven trafficking deeper into the dark corners of the Internet, making it harder for our investigators to follow.\n\nAccording to South Carolina\u2019s corrupt Attorney General, Alan Wilson, in the state of South Carolina, a position he\u2019s held for 16 years, human trafficking is up over 400%. And he\u2019s proud of it.\n\nIt\u2019s obscene. It\u2019s disgusting.\n\nAnd Alan, if you're listening or watching this right now, I\u2019ve got it coming for you.\n\nWe can do better.\n\nWe must do better.\n\nI am hoping to learn from our witnesses today what is working, what is not, and\u2014most importantly\u2014what Congress needs to do next.\n\nBecause many in our states, like Attorney General Alan Wilson, aren\u2019t doing anything.\n\nIn fact, I just learned recently, Alan Wilson prosecuted zero pedophile cases last year in the state of South Carolina. Zero.\n\nAre our current laws helping or hurting?\n\nDo we have the funding, the data-sharing authorities, and the public-private partnerships we need to turn good technology into rescued lives?\n\nAnd how do we make sure innovation outpaces the criminals who adapt overnight?\n\nCongress has both the responsibility and the ability to remove bureaucratic roadblocks, fund proven solutions, and write smarter laws which actually protect the vulnerable, instead of just making us feel like we did something.\n\nThere is no issue more urgent, and there is no excuse for inaction.\n\nI look forward to the testimony of our witnesses and to working with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to turn today\u2019s conversation into tomorrow\u2019s results.\n\nThank you.\n\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T20:09:11Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://mace.house.gov/media/press-releases/congresswoman-nancy-mace-opens-hearing-technology-combat-human-trafficking"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 2.16818880289793, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}