The National Council files amicus brief: Supports sex workers in their fight to restore their first amendment rights
The National Council, September 15, 2022: The National Council files amicus brief: Supports sex workers in their fight to restore their first amendment rights
“The National Council filed an amicus brief on September 13, 2022, in Woodhull Freedom Foundation v. United States (22-5105), a challenge to the constitutionality of the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Trafficking Act of 2017 (FOSTA), currently on appeal in the DC Circuit Court of Appeals. FOSTA creates civil and criminal liability for internet service providers who allow content that ‘promotes or facilitates’ sex trafficking. This broad and vague language has led ISPs to ban all content that could conceivably be connected to sex work, shutting down blacklist databases and making difficult for sex workers to screen clients.
“National Council Executive Director Andrea James said the organization supports decriminalizing sex work as ‘part of our effort to reimagine our communities in which people are safe and free to make their own decisions about how they earn a living.’ Far from stopping sex trafficking, FOSTA has made it worse by censoring communication between sex workers that kept them safe and enabled law enforcement to target predators.
“The National Council represented COYOTE-RI, a sex worker advocacy organization, which conducted a survey of 260 sex workers from July to August 2022 to document the harm that FOSTA has caused. Seventy-nine percent of survey participants (N=222) report that FOSTA prevented them from using screening procedures that made them feel safe. A large majority said that FOSTA had made them scared to advocate for decriminalization – not just online but in person as well.
“The National Council’s Senior Legal Counsel, Catherine Sevcenko, who wrote the amicus brief, said she ‘was proud to help vindicate the First Amendment rights of sex workers, whose voices and expertise must be heard to find a way to end the horror of human trafficking.’
“Eleven other organizations that advocate for sex workers, transgender, and LGBTQUIA+ signed onto the brief.”
Additional reading:
Woodhull Freedom Foundation v. United States, amicus brief field on September 13, 2022
The Verge, June 4, 2021: Internet sex trafficking law FOSTA-SESTA is almost never used, says government report
WHYY, July 10, 2020: FOSTA-SESTA was supposed to thwart sex trafficking. Instead, it’s sparked a movement
Vox, July 2, 2018: A new law intended to curb sex trafficking threatens the future of the internet as we know it
