Attorney General Pam Bondi and the Department of Justice have a great opportunity to advance the cause of protecting children from exploitation, an opportunity that previous attorneys general—from both parties—have failed to grasp. In 2008, Congress unanimously enacted the PROTECT Our Children Act, requiring that the attorney general “create and implement a National Strategy for Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction.” The law listed 19 comprehensive elements this strategy must include, such as long-range goals, measurable objectives and targets, budget priorities, a review of “the policies and work of the Department of Justice related to the prevention and investigation of child exploitation crimes,” interagency coordination plans, plans for reducing forensic lab backlogs, and a review of available data regarding domestic and international child pornography trafficking. The law required the attorney general to submit the initial strategy to Congress by Oct. 13, 2009, and “every second year thereafter.” Attorneys general of both parties have failed miserably to meet this obligation. Attorney General Eric Holder submitted the strategy in August 2010, ten months after it was due, and skipped it completely in 2011. Even after the Government Accountability Office criticized the Justice Department for failing to implement several provisions of the PROTECT Our Children Act, Holder failed to submit the strategy in 2013. Attorney General Loretta Lynch submitted the strategy due in October 2015, six months after it was due; Attorney General Jeff Sessions failed to submit it at all in 2017, as did Attorney General William Barr in 2019 and Attorney General Merrick Garland in 2021. The Government Accountability Office issued another scathing report in 2022, observing that the Justice Department’s failures were “due in part to it not making the strategy a priority.” The law, for example, required the attorney general to designate a senior official as the strategy’s national coordinator. Instead, a string of nine temporary detailees had filled that position in the previous 13 years. The last strategy, submitted by Lynch in 2016, “did not fully include 12 of the 19 required elements established in law.” Garland submitted an updated strategy in 2023, only the third of the eight required since Congress enacted the PROTECT Our Children Act—and the only one that arrived on time. The deadline for the next one passed a month ago.  This is a miserable record of failure to address a growing crisis. The 2023 strategy described profound changes in the 15 years since Congress enacted the PROTECT Our Children Act, detailing how “modern technology is the perfect tool for sex offenders, giving them access to children… while concealing their identities and locations.” Today, the report said, “there are more victims and more offenders than ever before, and a seemingly endless stream of [child sexual abuse material] circulating online.” Just a year prior, the Government Accountability Office noted that “the strategy is not up-to-date on key technology advances that are making it more difficult to catch perpetrators.” Now, Bondi has an opportunity not only to meet her statutory obligation but to use an updated strategy to show that these past failures and deficiencies are being fixed. She also has another obligation. In 2018, Congress unanimously enacted a law to make the existing statute requiring restitution for child pornography victims more effective. An analysis published earlier this year by The Heritage Foundation showed that under the new law, the median amount of restitution ordered for child pornography victims has nearly tripled and the portion of defendants who avoid paying any restitution has plunged by two-thirds. The new law created the “Defined Monetary Assistance Victims Reserve,” funded by a special assessment on convicted offenders, to provide a one-time restitution if a victim chooses to avoid seeking restitution through litigation. The law also required the attorney general to submit to Congress a report “on the progress of the Department of Justice in implementing the [new restitution law]…includ[ing] an assessment of the funding levels for the Child Pornography Victims Reserve.” That report was due five years ago but has never been submitted. Combatting child exploitation is one of the increasingly rare issues that is not plagued by partisan or ideological division and rancor. The crisis is getting worse and, sadly, our leaders have failed to do what they are legally required to do to protect children. Bondi should seize the opportunity to correct this injustice. The post Attorney General Bondi: Seize the Opportunity to Fight Child Exploitation appeared first on The Daily Signal.