Washington Engage seeks to eradicate sex and labor trafficking in Washington State by providing knowledge and tools that empower government, business, and grassroots leaders to take action.

Latest News & Updates

Federal Way City Council Passes Resolution

The Federal Way City Council and Mayor Skip Priest passed a resolution on Tuesday, May 15, urging the U.S. Conference of Mayors to call on Congress, state legislators, and local elected bodies to address commercial advertising over the Internet for sexual abuse of minors.  Specifically, he mentioned Backpage.com, a major player in the online trafficking Read more »

Backpage’s Defenses are Indefensible

Backpage has repeatedly and openly justified their continuation of advertising minors for prostitution online by using supposedly various legal and practical reasoning.  Their new counsel, Liz McDougall, is no stranger to representing such practices as she represented Craigslist back in 2010 when state attorneys general applied pressure on Craigslist. Her various defenses for Backpage’s business Read more »

Next Up for Washington Engage – More on Community Action Initiative

We’ve achieved our goal of passing the best anti-trafficking laws in the country. We’ve launched Businesses Ending Slavery and Trafficking (BEST) to engage small- and medium-size businesses in the anti-trafficking movement. Now we are turning to local communities to prevent human trafficking through our research-based Community Action Initiative (CAI). The goal of CAI is to Read more »

We have made a DIFFERENCE together!

Governor Gregoire signed TWELVE anti-trafficking bills on March 29th.  We are thrilled to share that nine of them came from Washington Engage’s Legislation Proposal packet and other recommendations presented last fall.  A Seattle Times column says this about one of the laws passed, “The law didn’t come in time to affect Mobley, who was driving Read more »

Rose shared collaboration research and experience at the NAAG Summit in Seattle

The Pillars of Hope Summit (March 28-30, 2012) – Attorneys General Unite against Human Trafficking – drew local, national and international leaders to Seattle , and Rose represented Washington Engage to speak on mobilization and collaboration derived from Washington Engage’s research and experience. Rob McKenna, Washington State Attorney General and current President of the National Association Read more »

Collaboration and the Freedom Registry National Database Launch on March 28th in Seattle

We collaborated with Chab Dai International to register Washington State anti-human trafficking organizations on the Freedom Registry in the past few months, and celebrated its launch on March 28th in Seattle.  Joan Jarman, the project manager for Freedom Registry, invited several researchers who presented their insights on collaboration in the anti-human trafficking movement.  Professor Kirsten Read more »

Curriculum Assessment Meeting Report from March 3rd

Thanks to the Federal Way Community Against Trafficking (formerly Federal Way Community Action Team) who organized this meeting to assess the three curriculum available right here in our state.  We have summarized the meeting as a tool for your community when considering promoting human trafficking prevention curriculum.  You are welcome to download the Human Trafficking Read more »

A Call to Action – Our Article Published in the King County Bar Association

“Using civil litigation is not only an alternative to criminal prosecution to hold traffickers accountable and to ensure victim compensation, but it will likely be an easier victory than criminal prosecution due to the lower burden of proof.”  Rose Gundersen and Tiffany Gorton co-authored this article published in the King County Bar Association’s March Bar Read more »