Over the past week, Karla Jacinto’s phone has not stopped buzzing. It buzzes as she sits with her daughters at their home in Mexico City, as she cooks dinner and as she curls up in bed.
The constant notifications are exhausting, said the 31-year-old who was thrust into the spotlight after last week’s State of the Union rebuttal, when Sen. Katie Boyd Britt (R-Ala.) told her story while lambasting the Biden administration’s immigration policies.
Jacinto is no stranger to attention, though. After escaping from the clutches of human trafficking almost 16 years ago, she has risen as a powerful voice for victims of the same crime. Now an advocate for Reintegra, an anti-human-trafficking organization that supports survivors as they rebuild their lives, she’s been face to face with top leaders in the United Kingdom, Mexico, the Vatican and the United States — meetings where she has shared her story to help prevent others from suffering similar abuse.
But this recent storm of notifications was about something different: Without naming or notifying Jacinto ahead of time, a U.S. politician had included a “totally distorted” version of her story in a politically charged speech, Jacinto said.
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“This isn’t a game for me,” Jacinto said. “People need to understand that we’re absolutely nobody’s circus.” Human trafficking — a complex crime affecting millions of people worldwide — should not be turned into a political talking point, she added.
The chain of events began during Britt’s rebuttal last Thursday night. After blaming President Biden for the recent uptick in immigration, Britt described talking to a woman who, at the hands of cartels, had been raped multiple times a day. The phrasing and lack of context appeared to imply that the woman was trafficked across the border in recent years, The Washington Post’s Fact Checker wrote.
Soon after, a journalist posted a video revealing that Britt had referred to Jacinto’s harrowing story — events that happened in Mexico almost 20 years ago and were not perpetuated by drug cartels but by a pimp.
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Britt’s office did not address questions about Jacinto’s case Wednesday night, instead criticizing Biden’s immigration policies. In a previous statement, Britt’s communications director told The Post that “the story Senator Britt told was 100% correct.”
A “circus,” as Jacinto put it, followed the State of the Union rebuttal. Hundreds of Jacinto’s Instagram and TikTok followers flooded her direct messages. A horde of reporters from all over the world soon followed. Jacinto’s name began trending on social media.
After surviving “four years in hell,” Jacinto said, it now feels as though some highlight only parts of her story that fit their narratives.
“As an advocate and survivor, the work I do every day of my life is what speaks for me,” Jacinto said. “It got to a point where I was getting so much attention in the U.S. from something different than what I do every day. How do I explain it … I felt bad.”
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Now, Jacinto hopes people can learn her story rather than a version shared by a politician.
Born in 1992, Jacinto’s earliest memories are of abuse. From the time she was 5, Jacinto said, she was sexually abused by a relative.
“All I knew was pain,” she said.
To cope, she pictured herself as Cinderella, Snow White and other fairy tale characters who, despite hardships, always end with a prince and a true love’s kiss.
That’s the future Jacinto envisioned for herself after a man approached her at a subway station. He told her things she had yearned to hear: I love you; you’re beautiful. Next came the roses, stuffed animals, chocolates and an invitation to go on a trip to nearby Puebla.
Jacinto was 12. The man, who had introduced himself as a car salesman, was 22.
After their trip, Jacinto’s mom threw her out of their home — pushing the tween to chase her dreams of a “big, loving family” with a man she barely knew but who owned a red, shiny car, she said.
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The first three months were bliss, but the red flags began to show early on, Jacinto said. The man and his cousins were pimps — and soon, they would force Jacinto into prostitution.
“My body unfortunately became used to the pain, the beatings and the humiliations,” she said.
Between 2004 and 2008, Jacinto said, she was trafficked across different Mexican cities — including Guadalajara, Irapuato and Puebla — and had, by her own estimates, been forced into sex with over 40,000 people. She said she got pregnant with twins and was forced to undergo an abortion. At 15, she gave birth to a daughter, but her pimp took the baby away for more than a year, she said. “When I got her back, my daughter became my inspiration to find a better life.”
In November 2008, Jacinto escaped with the help of a client, finding support in Fundación Camino a Casa, a shelter that provides resources for victims of sex trafficking. After spending over two years there, she said, she wanted to “become a voice for millions of women, a strong voice that would push for new laws and fundamental changes in my country and beyond.”
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Jacinto’s quest was featured in the 2016 documentary “Stopping Traffic” — during which director and producer Sadhvi Siddhali Shree said she was touched by Jacinto’s strength.
“Karla really opened up our eyes to what victims go through,” she said. “She’s truly the example that when they receive help, guidance support and feel loved, they can really shine in the world,” she said.
Since escaping captivity, Jacinto has given speeches across the world and began working with Reintegra — the same organization that provided her with funds to get through cosmetology school. She has shared her story with Pope Francis and members of Congress — testimony that was later used as evidence in support for Megan’s Law, which requires U.S. authorities to share any information relating to American child sex offenders when they attempt to travel abroad.
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“I felt seen,” Jacinto said. “I went from being an object and being told I didn’t have a voice to giving my opinion about a law to U.S. politicians.”
“I own my story now,” she added.
But that’s not how it feels when politicians share their own versions of her story, she said.
Last year, Jacinto was invited to speak in Eagle Pass, Tex., with three U.S. senators who made the trip there to “examine the disastrous effects of Biden’s border crisis firsthand,” according to a news release. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) wrote an op-ed saying she learned during a roundtable event with Jacinto and a former Mexican congresswoman that “cartels kidnap young women and girls to be exploited for sex and labor.”
Britt, who was also at the event, put out a news release at the time describing a woman who had been “raped at the hands of the drug cartels. Britt said something similar during her address last Thursday. Though Jacinto said she had recounted her experience from the early 2000s, she felt as though “pieces from my story” were used to describe the present. Jacinto said people familiar with her story, which didn’t involve cartels, began messaging her.
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It “froze me,” Jacinto said. “I felt like screaming,” she said.
Though her phone is still buzzing, Jacinto says she has hope that the recent attention raises awareness for victims of human trafficking.
“The truth is, we need so much help,” Jacinto said. “We need resources for victims. We need new laws that protect them. We need serious people who are going to put their money where their mouth is — and not just use this issue for a political spectacle.”
correction
A previous version of this article said that politicians conflated Karla Jacinto’s story with “the disastrous effects of Biden’s border crisis firsthand.” The quote is from a news release that didn’t mention Jacinto. The article has been corrected.
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