Paris Hilton appeared on Capitol Hill Thursday with a bipartisan group of lawmakers to advocate for a newly introduced bill to regulate “troubled teen” facilities, meant for young people struggling with behavioral issues and substance abuse.
Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), as well as Reps. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) and Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) joined Hilton at the Capitol to discuss the Stop Institutional Child Abuse Act, sponsored by Carter, Cornyn, Khanna and Merkley.
The bill would create federal data collection and reporting standards for the “troubled teen” industry and provide states with best practices to prevent abuse.
The Hilton Hotels heiress was a victim of the industry herself, she told the crowd at the Capitol. She described how staff across multiple “troubled teen” facilities physically and mentally abused her from ages 16 to 18.
“I witnessed and experienced sexual abuse from adult staff as well as endured verbal and emotional abuse daily. I was yelled at, dehumanized, silenced and stripped of any semblance of privacy,” she said.
“When I attempted to tell my parents about the abuse on the phone, staff would stop and immediately hang up the phone and punish me. On top of this, you had no access to the outside doors, no sunlight, no fresh air. These were considered privileges. What I went through will haunt me for the rest of my life.”
Hilton described being medically sedated against her will and forcibly restrained. She also said male staff members would watch her while she showered.
Other victims relayed their stories of abuse from residential facilities at young ages, as well.
“I don’t think my parents had any idea what they were signing up for either,” abuse survivor and activist Jessica Jackson said. “I don’t think that my parents had any idea that by spending my college savings on programs, they were exposing me to more trauma. They believed they were going to be able to save my life.”
“See, I’d lost my way somewhere around 12, 13. I was medicating my own depression. I even attempted to take my life. What I really needed was love, not exposure to the abuse in these programs,” she added.
“When it comes to institutional care, we discover that too often that without oversight, love and compassion are in short supply,” Merkley said. “That at far too many facilities, institutional care has become institutional abuse.”
Merkley explained that $23 billion in public funds finance childhood residential institutions nationally, impacting 60,000 kids, many of whom are in the foster care system. Not all kids are abused and not all facilities are bad, Tuberville and others noted, but many cases of abuse go unnoticed by authorities.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recommended crafting legislation outlining stricter guidelines for the facilities following a study into regulating the industry.
“Differing interpretations of what constitutes maltreatment may result in facilities over- or under-reporting incidents, thereby complicating states’ data collection efforts, according to state officials and other stakeholders,” the GAO report read.
The hope is that proper reporting can encourage states to stop abuse and ensure that parents know about the facilities’ practices, advocates said.
Hilton was last on the Hill in 2021 pushing for a similar measure, the Accountability for Congregate Care Act. Khanna and Merkley were also sponsors of that bill.
Khanna described an admiration for Hilton’s consistent commitment to advocating for survivors of child abuse under institutional care, as opposed to other celebrities who “fly in, they do a press conference, you have some bill introduced and then they leave.”
“They came in three years ago and I remember talking to Paris’s mom … and they said ‘We actually want to get legislation done.’ And month after month with the organization they’ve been working to meet members of Congress … doing the work to actually get something done,” he added.