Over seven months have passed since Congress allowed the 2008 reauthorization of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) to expire, and with bipartisan consensus crumbling there is no obvious way forward this year. CQ staff, Emily Cadei, provides a comprehensive snapshot of where the law presently stands post expiration of its authorization in her article, "Culture Wars Claim Trafficking Law," published today in CQ WEEKLY - IN FOCUS.

As Cadei points out, despite "guaranteed" federal funding for anti-trafficking programs for the remainder of FY12, "the failure to enact a new law would make those programs far more vulnerable in the budget battles for the future." Cory Smith, ATEST Senior Policy Advisor interviewed for the piece, stressed the importance of the TVPA. It "is the underpinning and the architecture of our government's fight against trafficking. And in an era of debt and a lot of cutting, it's not good at all to have programs that aren't authorized for funding."