Tim Tebow urges Senate panel to back bill to combat child trafficking

Former NFL quarterback Tim Tebow testified Tuesday before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism on Capitol Hill, urging lawmakers to pass the bipartisan Renewed Hope Act of 2026 to bolster federal efforts against child exploitation, trafficking and abuse, he said.

Tebow, founder and chair of the Tim Tebow Foundation, described the effort as a fight “for people who cannot fight for themselves in their darkest hour of need,” and said his foundation is supporting law enforcement and long-term restoration efforts for victims. He said the foundation currently supports 52 safe homes and is expanding that support to 19 more, according to the foundation.

The Renewed Hope Act would establish a dedicated workforce of more than 200 analysts, investigators and forensic specialists within DHS’s Homeland Security Investigations, or HSI, to coordinate child sexual exploitation investigations, supporters said. The bill would also provide training for officers on victim identification, location and rescue operations, its backers say. The measure cleared House committee markup earlier this year, supporters said.

According to the Tim Tebow Foundation, an estimated 57,000 victims of child trafficking remain unidentified in exploitation databases. Tebow told the panel that in the past six months more than 338,000 unique U.S.-based IP addresses have been linked to trading child sexual abuse images on peer-to-peer networks. “Every day, [these children] are praying that we are going to respond,” he said. “But how are we going to respond?”

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., who chairs the subcommittee, called child trafficking a “scourge” and said the hearing was meant to expose how young people are groomed and exploited and how the current system falls short. “Congress must dismantle the criminal networks that profit from exploiting the most vulnerable among us and put an end to child trafficking,” he said. Fox News Digital’s Scott Thompson contributed to this report.

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