{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.grassley.senate.gov/news/news-releases/judiciary-witnesses-urge-congress-to-immediately-address-online-child-extortion", "Judiciary Witnesses Urge Congress to Immediately Address Online Child Extortion", "2025-12-09", "2025", "2025-12", "Republican", "Senate", "IA", "Chuck Grassley", "G000386", "www.grassley.senate.gov", "grassley", "https://www.grassley.senate.gov/news/news-releases", "scraper", "WASHINGTON \u2013 Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) today chaired a hearing to examine emerging online threats against children and proposed legislative solutions. Grassley and Ranking Member Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) introduced three bipartisan bills to update federal sentencing guidelines, target violent online criminal networks and crack down on sextortion threats.\n\nIn response to Grassley\u2019s questions, witnesses highlighted an urgent need to address online child extortion \u2013 specifically sextortion and violent online criminal groups like the \u201c764\u201d network. The witnesses discussed gaps in U.S. law that allow child predators to run rampant, with one witness testifying that \u201cthe imagery, the videos, the chats that we are seeing and reading are some of the most graphic that I have ever seen in my 20-year history.\u201d\n\nGrassley questioned the following witnesses:\n\nTamia Woods, mother of James Woods and co-founder of the Do It For James Foundation\n\nLauren Coffren, Executive Director of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children\n\nJessica Lieber Smolar, Esq., Former Assistant United States Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania\n\nVIDEO\n\nOn combating sextortion:\n\nGrassley: \u201cRecently, there have been several news reports on the increase in sextortion cases, and how quickly bad actors can manipulate children\u2026 many of those children think that suicide is the answer\u2026 From a parent\u2019s point of view, why is it important to make sextortion illegal under federal law?\u201d\n\nWoods: \u201cWe have to make sure that, not only do our children see that we have their back on these issues, but we have to make sure that they know there are resources and laws that back them up.\u201d\n\n\u201cPeople need to be held accountable on top of that. They need to know that they shouldn\u2019t be comfortable with doing the things that they\u2019re doing. Right now they\u2019re comfortable, and you see more and more people being victimized because of that.\u201d\n\nOn violent online groups like 764:\n\nGrassley: \u201cMs. Coffren, you\u2019ve been with the National Center of Missing and Exploited Children for over 20 years, having served in a variety of positions involving online child safety. Can you describe the recent trends involving these violent gore groups like 764 and how they operate and target children online?\u201d\n\nCoffren: \u201cSadistic online exploitation, violent online groups\u2026 most often they\u2019re motivated purely by chaos. Their goal is to be able to weaponize our nation\u2019s children to create terror\u2026 Children may be looking for solace, for comfort, for advice in online platforms and spaces where they can find a community. Unfortunately, these offenders are infiltrating and targeting those communities.\n\n\u201cThe imagery, the videos, the chats that we are seeing and reading are some of the most graphic that I have ever seen in my 20-year history. We are hearing from law enforcement out in the field who\u2019ve said that this is the most disturbing content as well. So, you\u2019re talking about seasoned professionals who are really meeting their match with the new and evolving types of exploitation that we\u2019re seeing.\u201d\n\nOn gaps in federal law:\n\nGrassley: \u201cMs. Smolar\u2026 can you share why we need federal legislation specifically to address these gore groups and other individuals who engage in sextortion? Please share your experience in working investigations involving these groups.\u201d\n\nSmolar: \u201cCongress has provided so many important tools to those of us in the field, like mandatory minimums for crimes like receipt and distribution of child pornography or production. [Prosecutors] need those tools in order to properly hold these types of defendants accountable. Right now, when [prosecutors] charge crimes like sextortion or 764 across the country, we all charge them differently\u2026 There\u2019s no consistency that allows [prosecutors] to properly address the specific harm that these actors are committing.\n\n\u201cIn addition, a lot of these actors are overseas. It would be extremely helpful for those of us who want to extradite people here to the United States, to hold them accountable, to have a felony statute that specifically speaks to this harm.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m familiar with a case where a defendant was in Germany. Germany had a coercion to harm statute, but [the United States] did not. [Germany] was able to charge that 764 offender there, but we could not charge him here. That shouldn\u2019t happen. We should be able to charge these offenders, hold them accountable and deter them from continuing to hurt our children.\u201d", 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://www.grassley.senate.gov/news/news-releases/judiciary-witnesses-urge-congress-to-immediately-address-online-child-extortion"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.6416548751294613, "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"}