House of Representatives
 
 Rep. George Miller (D-CA) and the House Education and Labor Committee
Rep. George Miller has been spearheading an investigation into the behavior modification industry.  In 2004, Rep. Miller stated:
“There is a laundry list of abuse of children at WWASPS schools: deprivation of food, deprivation of contact with their peers, physical abuse, mental abuse, sexual abuse, and parents are paying big money for services not rendered," Miller added in a Nov. 6 news release.”
While Rep. Miller was focusing on a particular group of behavior modification programs called the World Wide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools (WWASPS), these abuses are in fact widespread throughout the industry.
 

In 2004, Rep. Miller engaged in correspondence with then Attorney General John Ashcroft regarding the need for this industry to be investigated by the Department of Justice.  Mr. Ashcroft declined the request stating that protecting children from privatized torture and wrongful death was beyond the scope of the Department of Justice and that any such abuses were “private contractual issues”. 

 
Committee Hearings 
In October of 2007 (http://www.beyondbusiness.net/congress.htm) and April of 2008 (http://www.beyondbusiness.net/congress2.htm), the House Education and Labor Committee held hearings regarding system-wide torture and cult-like brainwashing in behavior modification programs throughout the United States.  
Legislative Response  

In 2007, Rep. Miller introduced HR 1738, the “End Institutionalized Abuse of Children Act of 2007”.  That legislation has devolved into the legislation that passed the House in 2008.  HR 6358, the “Stop Child Abuse in Residential Programs Act of 2008” passed the House in June of 2008.  HR 6358 did not pass the Senate before 2009.  In 2009, HR 6358 was renamed HR 911, the "Stop Child Abuse in Residential Programs Act of 2009".  There are a number of problems with this legislation and it does not adequately or appropriately deal with the system-wide human rights and civil rights violations rampant in this industry.  There is an online petition to revise this legislation at: http://www.petitiononline.com/hr911. 

 
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC)  
The FTC had this to say in their warning:
 
“If you are a parent or guardian and think you have exhausted intervention alternatives for a troubled teen, you may be considering a private residential treatment program. These programs go by a variety of names, including “therapeutic boarding schools,” “emotional growth academies,” “teen boot camps,” “behavior modification facilities,” and “wilderness therapy programs. ”No standard definitions exist for specific types of programs. The programs are not regulated by the federal government, and many are not subject to state licensing or monitoring as mental health or educational facilities, either. A 2007 Report to Congress by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found cases involving serious abuse and neglect..”
 
The Surgeon General’s Warning  
The Surgeon General of the United States, reports:  
 
“Concerns about residential care primarily relate to criteria for admission; inconsistency of community-based treatment established in the 1980s; the costliness of such services (Friedman & Street, 1985); the risks of treatment, including failure to learn behavior needed in the community; the possibility of trauma associated with the separation from the family; difficulty reentering the family or even abandonment by the family; victimization by RTC [Residential Treatment Center] staff; and learning of antisocial or bizarre behavior from intensive exposure to other disturbed children (Barker, 1998). “