As challenged in a New York Times editorial, the confirmation of Loretta Lynch for attorney general, which apparently isn’t otherwise problematic to senators of either party, is being held captive to more political concerns.

What does the abortion issue have to do with the prevention of human trafficking? Nothing.

What do either of those things have to do with Loretta Lynch, whom President Obama nominated more than four months ago to succeed Eric Holder Jr. as attorney general of the United States? Even less.

Yet Ms. Lynch’s confirmation as the nation’s top law enforcement officer — which seemed like a sure thing only a few weeks ago — is being held hostage to last-minute political mischief.

Connections in Washington, of course, need not be connections as others may see them, such as having a rational relationship. But by Senate standards, the connections appear pretty clear.

Senate Republicans said as recently as last week that they would schedule Ms. Lynch’s confirmation vote for this week, but, on Sunday, the majority leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said that won’t happen until the Senate moves forward on a bipartisan [sex] trafficking bill, which would, among other things, establish a fund for victims through a fine paid by those convicted of trafficking crimes.

And so the Democrats refused to hop aboard this new sex trafficking law? Get real.

The legislation, which sailed through committee in February, stalled last week when Democrats noticed a provision that would prohibit money in the fund from being used to pay for abortions.

Boom. Abortions. The Dems are all for the law otherwise.  The phrase “sex trafficking” was a stroke of criminal law marketing genius. It evokes images of the horrors of slavery, and indeed covers those horrors.  The mere mention of sex trafficking is enough to make the most strident supporters of the Constitution weep, so much so that they’re blinded to anything else.

The problem is that it goes much further.  Take a phrase that seems so horrible and it smooths the way to slide in any conduct within it.  At Reason, Elizabeth Nolan Brown explains the trafficking law:

It would expand Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents’ mandate to fight all manner of cyber-crime. It would fund a ton of law enforcement initiatives, from efforts at the FBI to small-town police departments (even paying the salaries of prosecutors and police officers who work on trafficking cases), using money from a newly created Domestic Trafficking Victims’ Fund. It would make soliciting prostitution from a trafficked individual or anyone under age 18 the legal equivalent of sex trafficking, and make it harder for those charged to use not knowing the individual was trafficked and/or a minor as a defense.

And it would authorize a $5,000 charge to anyone found guilty of trafficking or other illicit sexual conduct (in addition to any court-ordered penalties), to go back into the fund that pays the salaries of police and prosecutors.

The law already prohibits what is understood to be “sex trafficking,” the “slavery” aspect of forcing people into engaging in the sex trade against their will. It similarly prohibits sex with minors.  And of course, soliciting prostitution has long been a crime.

“Clarify the range of conduct punished as sex trafficking” and make “absolutely clear for judges, juries, prosecutors, and law enforcement officials that criminals who purchase sexual acts from human trafficking victims may be arrested, prosecuted, and convicted as sex trafficking offenders.” This would be accomplished by amending the federal criminal code to make “patronizing” or “soliciting” a victim of trafficking a crime equivalent to “recruiting, enticing, harboring, transporting, obtaining, or maintaining” a trafficking victim. The person soliciting the victim would not have to know they are trying to purchase sex from someone underage or someone trafficked, merely act “in reckless disregard of the fact” that this was possible. “The Government need not prove that the defendant knew that the person had not attained the age of 18 years,” the criminal code specifically states.

But this law makes it very different, converting the “johns” into sex traffickers based upon whether the person with whom they solicit sex is enslaved or underage.  It then adds a $5,000 penalty, on top of any fine or sentence of incarceration imposed by a court, to fund itself.

Fund private, municipal, and state efforts to establish “dedicated anti-trafficking law enforcement units and task forces” and “ensure that Federal law enforcement officers are engaged in activities, programs, or operations involving the detection, investigation, and prosecution” of sex trafficking.

Establish the “Human Exploitation Rescue Operative (HERO) Child Rescue Corps.” In the HERO Corps, “the returning military heroes of the United States are trained and hired to investigate crimes of child exploitation in order to target predators and rescue children from sexual abuse and slavery.”

Create a Computer Forensics Unit and a Child Exploitation Investigations Unit within the Cyber Crimes Center (a division of U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement) to investigate trafficking, IP theft, money laundering, arms proliferation, and “illicit activity” on the deep web.

As Senate Majority Leader, Mitch  McConnell, says, it’s a comprehensive bill.  No kidding. And whoever came up with the HERO acronym should get a bonus, because that’s the sort of stuff people adore.

So where’s the sticking point?

Senate Democrats have been raising a fuss about language in the bill which would prohibit money in the Domestic Victims’ Traffic Fund from being used to help human trafficking victims obtain abortions.

It’s not that the Republicans don’t care deeply for these victims, but lines must be drawn, you know. And that, by Washington logic, is why Loretta Lynch can’t have nice things.