United States disparately by swiftly returning them to their home country absent indications of trafficking or a credible fear of return, but allowing for the release of unaccompanied alien children from noncontiguous countries into the interior of the United States, often to those individuals who paid to smuggle them into the country in the first place. (3) The provisions of the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 governing unaccompanied alien children have enriched the cartels, who profit hundreds of millions of dollars each year by smuggling unaccompanied alien children to the southwest border, exploiting and sexually abusing many such unaccompanied alien children on the perilous journey. (4) Prior to 2008, the number of unaccompanied alien children encountered at the southwest border never exceeded 1,000 in a single year. (5) The United States is currently in the midst of the worst crisis of unaccompanied alien children in our Nation’s history, with over 350,000 such unaccompanied alien children encountered at the southwest border since Joe Biden became President. (6) In 2022, during the Biden Administration, 152,057 unaccompanied alien children were encountered, the most ever in a single year and an over 400 percent increase compared to the last full fiscal year of the Trump Administration in which 33,239 unaccompanied alien children were encountered. (7) The Biden Administration has lost contact with at least 85,000 unaccompanied alien children who entered the United States since Joe Biden took office. (8) The Biden Administration dismantled effective safeguards put in place by the Trump Administration that protected unaccompanied alien children from being abused by criminals or exploited for illegal and dangerous child labor. (9) A recent New York Times investigation found that unaccompanied alien children are being exploited in the labor market and are ending up in some of the most punishing jobs in the country. . (10) The Times investigation found unaccompanied alien children,