Ossoff: Child welfare agencies need tools to protect foster kids | News

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) found in October that between 2018 and 2022, 1,790 children in the care of Georgia’s foster care system were reported missing. During a hearing of the subcommittee last month in Atlanta, witnesses testified that children missing from foster care are particularly vulnerable to sex trafficking.

“What is happening to foster children across the United States is not acceptable,” Ossoff said Thursday during another hearing held by his subcommittee. “The number of children who are going missing from foster care is unacceptable.”

Ossoff and Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, the subcommittee’s ranking Republican, criticized lax oversight by federal and state child welfare agencies when it comes to missing children.

Ossoff cited audits of multiple states that found 45% of missing child incidents were not reported to NCMEC and that most missing children were not screened for sex trafficking after they were recovered.

Blackburn said the federal government can’t find 85,000 missing migrant children.

“We’ve seen reports of these children working in factories (and) food processing plants,” she said. “We should not have to read more reports of children being used for child labor or sex trafficking rings.”