Jessica Pliley presents Sexual Surveillance: Sex Trafficking and the Growth of the FBI, 1910-1941 America’s first anti–sex trafficking law, the 1910 Mann Act, made it illegal to transport women over state lines for prostitution “or any other immoral purpose.” It was meant to protect women and girls from being seduced or sold into sexual slavery. However, in upholding the Mann Act, the FBI built its national power by expanding its legal authority to police Americans’ sexuality and by marginalizing the very women it was charged to protect. Jessica R. Pliley is an Associate Professor of Women’s and Gender History at Texas State University and holds a Ph.D. from the Ohio State University. She is the author of Policing Sexuality: The Mann Act and the Making of the FBI and Global Anti-Vice Activism . This event is sponsored with Phi Alpha Theta, UAA History Dept., UAA Honors College and Cook Inlet Historical Society.