Women wearing only "g-strings" while bending over in front of
traffic has become an increasingly common sight in National City,
California, as prostitution issues spiral after the implementation
of a controversial state law, the city’s mayor told Fox News
Digital.

"They're waving to people on the freeway or, just to be honest with
you, they are bending over for the freeway. I don’t know how else to
put it; they're showing their wares," National City Mayor Ron
Morrison told Fox News Digital in an interview this month.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 357 in July 2022,
which repealed a previous law that banned loitering with the intent
to engage in prostitution. The law took effect in January this year,
with Morrison arguing that the moment Newsom’s pen touched the bill,
pimps in the state knew they could expand their prostitution
ventures with little repercussions from law enforcement.

"The moment it was signed by the governor, boom, everyone knew the
rules were out the window," Morrison told Fox News Digital.

CALIFORNIA CITIES RATTLED BY PROSTITUTION, HUMAN TRAFFICKING IN
BROAD DAYLIGHT AS COPS PIN BLAME ON NEW LAW

"Those that are out there on the street, most of them are wearing
less than what you would consider a scanty negligee. It is just
flaunting in everybody's face. And so a lot of people are screaming,
‘Hey, you know, can't you get them on indecent exposure?’ And the
problem is the way our laws read in this state. The definition of
indecent exposure is as long … as the genitals are covered. Anything
else is fair game out in public."

CALIFORNIA PROSTITUTION LAW ALLOWS SEX ABUSE TO 'RUN RAMPANT' IN LOS
ANGELES STREETS, VICTIM ADVOCATES WARN

National City is a diverse working-class city of roughly 60,000
residents just outside San Diego on the bay, Morrison said.
Prostitution issues are no stranger to the city, with the mayor
explaining that as an urban area, sex workers have been known to
cross the San Diego city border – but never at the rate he’s
currently seeing.

"Very much beyond brazen," Morrison said of what he’s seeing on his
streets.

Prostitutes gather in a downtown area that faces a freeway and are
most often seen early in the morning and around 3 p.m. Morrison
added that another new California law that legalized jaywalking has
compounded the issues as some women stand in traffic to attract a
john.

"I was driving on one of the streets the other day, and there's this
young lady standing there in the middle of the street wearing
basically a G-string, and that was it, and a couple pasties. But
she's right in front of my car, I couldn't move. So, I did ask her
very politely, ‘Would you please move out of the street?’ And she
looked at me and says, 'If you don't want to talk to me, you can go
around,'" Morrison said.

Businesses, ranging from mom-and-pop stores to national hotel
chains, have sounded off to the mayor that the prostitutes are
driving away business and have forced some businesses to refund
families who were appalled at seeing nearly naked women while on
their California getaway.

Even a local school covered its windows after prostitutes were
repeatedly found hanging out near its gates, Morrison said.

The mayor argues that the issue comes down to Senate Bill 357, which
he called an "idiotic law" that should be known as the "Safe Streets
for Pimps Initiative," which has allegedly not only left his town
and other municipalities in the state dealing with an increase of
sex workers on the street, but it has also incentivized human
trafficking.

"This one has just opened the doors to prostitution, sex
trafficking, child sex trading, I mean, you name it. This has
obviously done that. And I don't think anyone that is not just
purely politically motivated could disagree with that," Morrison
said.

The mayor described himself as a "nonpartisan" who has worked at
various levels of government over more than 30 years, whose main
focus is to "look out for people in National City and their
businesses" and not play politics in Sacramento.

Senate Bill 357 was authored by Democrat state Sen. Scott Wiener,
who championed the bill as one that would help protect transgender
women from being targeted by police.

"[The previous law] allowed police officers to arrest a person, not
based on what they did but based solely on how a person looks,"
Wiener told local media earlier this year. "So, an officer could
arrest someone because they were wearing tight clothing, high heels
and extra lipstick."

Fox News Digital previously spoke with members of the Coalition to
Abolish Slavery and Trafficking (CAST), which is one of the largest
and oldest direct service providers for sex and labor trafficking
survivors in the U.S., who said they supported the bill "because we
know that reducing the criminalization of survivors will help
prevent human trafficking."

NATIONWIDE PUSH TO LIBERALIZE PROSTITUTION LAWS PROMPTS CONCERNS
ABOUT HUMAN TRAFFICKING

"Traffickers rely on our systems to criminalize victims so that they
are unable to access safety due to their records and are vulnerable
to continued exploitation," Leigh LaChapelle, CAST's associate
director of survivor advocacy, told Fox News earlier this year after
the law took effect.

"The impact of these encounters with law enforcement reinforce
already heightened stigma when someone is arrested for this offense
due to the difficulties securing employment and safe housing with an
arrest record relating to the sex trade," LaChapelle added.
"Violation of this discriminatory law also puts immigrants in
jeopardy of deportation, loss of residency or denial of reentry due
to a misdemeanor conviction."

Prostitution is still illegal in California, but Morrison said the
new law has effectively legalized the crime as police back off from
intervening or interacting with the women.

"Senate Bill 357, which for all intents and purposes made
prostitution legal because what it said is that officers can no
longer contact people based on the idea of loitering for the purpose
of prostitution. So, it basically tells the police your hands are
off," Morrison said.

AS CALIFORNIA POLICE FIGHT RAMPANT PROSTITUTION, JOHNS LINE UP LIKE
THEY'RE AT 'FAST-FOOD DRIVE-THROUGH'

He noted that some of the girls on the street appear underaged,
though the amount of makeup the sex workers wear makes it difficult
to gauge an age, and the city has previously seen girls as young as
12 working on the streets.

"A lot of the times [police] found out that these were juveniles …
or that they were basically being sex trafficked, and they could get
them out of that. Now, they basically have no legal opportunity to
even talk to them," Morrison said.

With prostitution blatantly on the streets, other crimes have also
followed, including shootings and assaults. Morrison said that just
weeks ago an eight-month pregnant prostitute was kidnapped, beaten
and raped.

"Those [crime incidents] go on our crime stats. We've had shootings,
everything else involving the prostitutes and the pimps. So, those
crime stats go on us. These people don't live here in National City
and people here don't want them, but we're getting the crime stats,"
he said.

Morrison said he is working with the local district attorney and the
police department to craft avenues on how to navigate the state laws
while cleaning up the streets. The police department has carried out
"john stings" in the past, but such operations require a team of
roughly 30 officers, which would translate to half of the city’s
police force, and weeks of planning, Morrison said.

"People here are not happy about this in the least. And the problem
is they expect us locally to do something about it. And we're
sitting here with our hands behind our back with handcuffs on that
Sacramento was placed on us," Morrison said.

https://www.foxnews.com/us/nearly-naked-prostitutes-prowl-streets-
broad-daylight-california-law-ties-cops-hands-mayor