Back in 2019, a police sex worker sting by nearly a dozen bureaus oversaw the arrests of 62 people during the 15-day operation, the majority of them in Odessa. This brought awareness of a severe problem in Texas: sex trafficking.

According to Texas Monthly podcast Boomtown, most of the sex workers in the Permian Basin are sex trafficking victims. A guest on the podcast pointed out that in the Permian Basin is a major hub for sex traffickers.

Boomtown guest host Susan Elizabeth Shepard pointed out that the problem is many lawmakers don't take sex trafficking seriously enough. Shepard said that there are many misconceptions regarding sex work and sex trafficking.

"When Dallas hosted the Superbowl in 2011, then Texas attorney general repeated an unsubstantiated claim that the Superbowl leads to a spike in trafficking," Shepard said. "Ever since then, the NFL, law enforcement, and the anti-trafficking organizations have all pushed back on that myth, but it hasn't stopped a round of similar stories coming out every year." 

Shepard also says "the boom itself is the big event that is supposed to increase trafficking." Shepard added that there are victims of sex trafficking and there are willing participants in the sex working trade. 

According to a story in The Texas Tribune, one trafficking victim, a woman going by the name "Yvette," said prosecutors called her a "pimp" because she was helping a teenager. Both were being sold for sex.

Texas Monthly reports there isn't any evidence of spikes in trafficking. However, there was a sudden "uptick" in the number of sex workers in the area, the Odessa Police Department said in a statement.