Q&A: Keeping Kids Safe from Harm

04.26.2024

Q: How are you working to help at-risk kids grow up in safe homes?

A: Society has a moral imperative to protect the next generation from harm. Every child deserves to grow up in a safe, loving home to reach their full potential. As a father of five and grandfather of nine, I understand the responsibilities of parenthood are demanding. Raising kids is an around-the-clock job, filled with sleepless nights when they're infants, followed by losing sleep when they're teenagers gaining more independence from mom and dad. Nurturing and nourishing their minds and bellies, while managing the demands of a job and household are challenging, for certain. Family is the cornerstone of civil society, and keeping this institution strong strengthens America. At the policymaking table in Washington, D.C., I roll up my sleeves to strengthen adoption, child welfare and juvenile justice laws that protect at-risk youth and also lead efforts to keep families intact. A few years ago, I advanced passage of the prevention-focused Family First Prevention Services Act that took effect in October 2019. It provides support to states to expand substance abuse and parenting skills programs, as well as mental health services for families to help prevent the need to remove children from the home in the first place.

When I co-founded the bipartisan Senate Caucus on Foster Youth in 2009, I made it my mission to ensure young people placed in foster care have a voice at the table. My work to improve outcomes for kids and teenagers who have been removed from their homes due to neglect or abuse is informed by the feedback I get from them. The most emphatic plea I hear from these young people is the desire to grow up in a safe, permanent, loving home. So, I work to help make sure federal policies aren't creating obstacles for reunification or adoption. One of the challenges confronting child welfare advocates across the country is the shortage of qualified foster families. In turn, that means lack of placement options in family-based settings for kids awaiting adoption or reunification with their parents. This Congress, I introduced bipartisan, bicameral legislation called the Recruiting Families Using Data Actto improve recruitment, retention and support for foster parents. Our bill would bring vital voices to the table - from birth, adoptive and foster parents to kinship and community-based providers, as well as youth with lived experiences in foster care and adoption - to help improve outreach in local communities to identify and screen potential foster families and provide better supports for existing foster families. It would require state agencies to gather data to inform policymakers about licensing, training and reasons why foster families decide to stop taking placements, for example. I'll continue pushing for Senate passage this year. Congress must do its part to help at-risk kids have a safe place to call home.

Q: What are your recent efforts to prevent child exploitation and protect survivors?

A: First of all, I encourage every parent to be vigilant for human trafficking and online exploitation of their kids. It happens right under our noses, including in Iowa. As former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I've led efforts to tackle these heinous crimes that trade on commercial exploitation of people, including children, through forced labor and sexual slavery and to raise awareness about cybercrimes known as financial sextortion. I helped steer the bipartisanTrafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Actthrough Congress that renewed vital programs to prevent human trafficking, promote justice for survivors and provide services to victims of these crimes. I also worked with Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire to secure passage of the Survivor's Bill of Rights in the States Act that will improve support for rape survivors, including the right to receive a medical forensic kit without charge, no matter which state they live in and to be informed in writing about its collection and preservation. Most recently, my bipartisan bill with Sen. Jon Ossoff of Georgia sharpens the existing federal sex tourism prevention law in the aftermath of the sexual abuse scandal involving hundreds of young athletes by convicted former doctor of U.S.A. Gymnastics, Larry Nassar. All three of these bills have been signed into law.

I'm glad the U.S. Department of Justice reached a settlement with the survivors of Larry Nassar's abuse and commend them for their courage to speak up and pursue justice, including their public testimony at a congressional hearing I convened in 2021. I'll continue my robust oversight of the FBI to help ensure its failures to protect these young women doesn't happen again.

April is Child Abuse Prevention Month.