Category Archives: Action Alerts

WE ARE BEGGING: Call & email to kill the KING AMENDMENT!

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People, this is HUGE.

Right now — now, not later — please call your Representative in the U.S. Congress and ask that she or he demand to strip the King Amendment from the Farm Bill. The King Amendment  would overturn every voter-approved animal welfare ballot measure relating to agriculture – Prop 2 in CA (veal and gestation crates, battery cages), Prop 6 in CA (the sale of horses for slaughter), Prop 204 in AZ (veal and gestation crates), and Amendment 10 in Florida (gestation crates). It could also void six other state bans on gestation crates, horse slaughter bans in a half-dozen other states, the comprehensive animal welfare standards adopted by the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board, and other anti-downer laws and animal protection laws designed to shield farm animals from abuse. Under this amendment, we would have no state laws for agricultural facilities relating to worker rights, animal welfare, environmental protection, or public health.

During his ten years (HOW? WHY?!) in Congress, the Republican Steve King from Iowa has attempted to block all animal welfare laws. He favors killing horses for human consumption, killing American bison in Yellowstone National Park, and trophy killing of polar bears, even though they are an endangered species. He opposes every bill against dogfighting and cockfighting. He even opposed including pets in disaster planning.

Please make a brief, polite phone call to your U.S. Representative. Just say, “Hi, I’m calling to ask that Representative NAME oppose the King Amendment to the Farm Bill, which slashes protections for animals and violates state’s rights.” If the person you speak with doesn’t know your representative’s position, please leave your name and phone number, and ask for a call back. Send a follow-up email saying the same thing.

I can only say again, this is HUGE. I can’t think of any other piece of legislation that has the potential to cause such suffering for so many. 

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When Wolves Lose Endangered Species Act Protection, We Lose Wolves!

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The United States Fish and Wildlife Services (USFWS) has announced a plan to delist all wolves throughout the United States (except Mexican wolves) who are currently protected by the Endangered Species Act. This reckless and politically motivated plan will intensify the ongoing slaughter of wolves. We have already seen tragedy in western states where hateful anti-wolf rhetoric and politics trump ethics and science.

wolf in creek, credit Jim Robertson

When wolves lost their ESA protection in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, these states immediately began to allow a recreational slaughter. Wolves are being injured and killed by bow hunters, gunned down by trophy hunters, tortured by trappers in steel-jaw foothold traps and snares, and subjected to other brutal “management” methods, including aerial gunning. More than 1,100 wolves have been killed in these states since Congress took ESA protection away from them in 2011.

Has the human behavior that caused the endangerment of wolves and made necessary their protection changed? No! This question, not just numbers, should determine whether this species can afford to lose ESA protection. Wolves are still discriminated against and misunderstood, their role as important top carnivores for the integrity of ecosystems is not sufficiently valued, and they are hated by the livestock industry, ranchers and hunters.

Learn more and sign the petition at the IDA site.

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Urge USDA To Confiscate Elephant Lucky From The San Antonio Zoo

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In a shocking move, the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) reportedly approved a request by the San Antonio Zoo to keep a 53-year-old female Asian elephant named Lucky in isolation. Lucky is now the only solitary female elephant in an AZA-accredited zoo in the U.S. The zoo’s director told the media that Lucky will remain at the zoo  until she dies. The zoo’s other elephant, Queenie, died in March.

elephant Lucky San Antonio ZooNo elephant should ever be held in solitary confinement. Female elephants are profoundly social – they live in matriarchal, multi-generational herds in the wild that include sisters, aunts, nieces, and nephews.

The AZA’s own guidelines require that elephants are housed in groups of three, yet the AZA is inexplicably sanctioning the San Antonio Zoo’s cruel decision to keep Lucky alone. This is the third variance the AZA has given to the zoo in a decade to house Lucky alone, despite pleas from IDA and our members to deny the unreasonable (and inhumane) requests and instead send Lucky to a facility that can meet her physical and social needs.

You can learn more and sign the petition at the IDA site.

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Help us defeat the “Rotten Egg Bill” (S.820) – tell Sen. Maria Cantwell to withdraw her sponsorship

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The Rotten Egg Bill has reared its ugly head again. Senator Maria Cantwell has just signed on as a cosponsor of the EGG PRODUCTS INSPECTION ACT AMENDMENTS OF 2013 (S.820), which would condemn egg-laying hens to confinement in battery cages forever, and would prohibit any future challenge by state law or public vote. This bill does nothing but benefit the animal abusers. It will do nothing to help the birds; in fact, it will do just the opposite. Please urge Senator Cantwell to withdraw her sponsorship and ask Senator Patty Murray to vote NO

[Ed: You can read more about our official position in opposition to it when it was introduced last year here. And as detailed below, this year's bill is even worse than the one that failed last year.]

From All-Creatures.org (originally Posted: May 8, 2013)

The Rotten Egg Bill aka “The Screaming Hen Bill” Needs Our Help To Be Defeated!

FROM United Poultry Concerns (UPC)

ACTION

United Poultry Concerns opposes the EGG PRODUCTS INSPECTION ACT AMENDMENTS OF 2013. We oppose legislation that benefits egg producers and legally condemns hens to living in cages. With Congress set to consider the Farm Bill shortly, please notify your U.S. Senators and Representatives that you oppose the Egg Products Inspection Act Amendments. Urge them to oppose this legislation and briefly and clearly explain your reason.

Call Senators and/or Representatives at (202) 224-3121.

To send letters, faxes, emails:

Find and contact your U.S. Senators
http://www.senate.gov/

Find and contact your U.S. Representative
http://www.house.gov/

INFORMATION / TALKING POINTS

Also visit The Screaming Hen Bill – opposition!

Before you read further, please watch “Normal and Natural,” a short video by Edgar’s Mission in Australia.

“This legislation puts cages in place, puts them in law. That’s a huge cave-in . . .” – Joe Miller, attorney for Rose Acre Farms Battery Cage Hen Operation, 2nd largest egg producer in the U.S., 2013.

Facts:
The Egg Bill would legalize and legitimize cages for hens
What is an enriched cage?
Helping Hens or Benefiting Their Abusers?
What Should I Do?

In “Agreement Raises Flags for Egg-Laying Hens” published in 2012, United Poultry Concerns reviewed the effort by animal advocates to ban cages for egg-laying hens in Europe and the United States. In 2011, a pact between The Humane Society of the United States and United Egg Producers frustrated this effort, which also failed in the European Union when a law went into effect January 1, 2012 banning conventional barren battery cages while legalizing “enriched” or “furnished” battery cage systems for hens in the EU.

Following suit, the alliance between HSUS and UEP led to legislation before Congress in 2012. The Egg Products Inspection Act Amendments of 2012 (The “Egg Bill”) sought to legalize cages for egg-laying hens, prevent voters from initiating ballots to ban cages in their own state, and prohibit states from passing stronger welfare laws than those set in the Egg Bill.

Last year’s bills failed but are once again before Congress. Under the terms of the 2013 Egg Bill sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California and Rep. Curt Schrader of Oregon, barren battery cages would be phased out over a 20-year period and replaced by “enriched” cages as the dominant housing system for hens in the United States.

The Egg Bill would legalize and legitimize cages for hens

Since cages are the cheapest way to mass-produce billions of eggs for consumers, the majority of the 280 million hens in U.S. facilities will continue to be caged in long windowless buildings just as they are now, under the proposed law.

This year’s Egg Bill is even worse than last year’s: one of the worst exemptions allows the toxic excretory ammonia levels of 25 parts per million in confined-hen buildings to reach even higher levels of toxicity to accommodate egg industry “emergencies” of unspecified duration. The toxic ammonia the Egg Bill permits constitutes animal cruelty even without cages.

What is an enriched cage?

In her forthcoming book Chickens’ Lib: The Story of a Campaign, Clare Druce, founder of Chickens’ Lib in England in the 1970s, summarizes in “Enriched” Cages – A Gaping Loophole in the “Welfare” Law for Egg-Laying Hens in the European Union:

Basically it’s still a battery cage, the birds living behind bars on metal grid flooring, the cages stacked up in tiers, many thousands of hens to a building. Compared to the old-style cage, there’s mandatory additional floor space per hen measuring roughly the size of a postcard, bringing the entire minimum space per hen to 750 square centimeters (116 square inches), little more than a sheet of paper.

The cages must include a perch, a “nest” box and a scratch pad. The term “nest box” sounds comforting, Clare says. “But in the enriched cage context it is simply a curtained area, behind which the hen finds the same sloping cage floor, the metal grid now covered in matting of some kind. Not a wisp of straw, no soft material with which to arrange her nest. Some of the enriched colony cages I saw held up to 60 hens. Gleaming metal cages stretched away into the distance, and there was that familiar unending clamor of frustrated hens’ voices.”

Helping Hens or Benefiting Their Abusers?

Under the terms of the Egg Bill, the majority of hens will remain in cages. They will be locked into a federal law administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture which doesn’t even enforce the 55-year-old “Humane Slaughter Act,” from which birds are excluded.

At most, brown hens, being slightly larger than the white hens who represent the majority of egg-laying hens in the United States, may within 20 years get a maximum of 144 square inches apiece, or one square foot of living space per hen. The white hens will max out at 124 square inches per hen, well below a square foot, even though a hen needs a minimum 1.5 square foot, or 216 square inches, merely to engage in minimal “normal behavior.”

Whether the Egg Bill would ban starvation molting of hens is a question. The ammonia cave-in and the cage cave-in show how capitulation to egg industry economics and “emergencies” will likely influence the bill as it moves through the legislative process to its final, eviscerated form.

The claim that the proposed legislation would ban inhumane methods of “euthanasia” is totally false. Spent hens are just piles of garbage – a costly nuisance – to egg producers, to be gotten rid of any old way. Like the male chicks of the egg industry who are trashed as soon as they are born, their sisters are a waste product to this industry as soon as they lay fewer eggs. Gassing hens to death with CO2 in metal boxes is NOT EUTHANASIA!

What Should I Do?

United Poultry Concerns opposes the Egg Products Inspection Act Amendments. We oppose legislation that benefits egg producers and legally condemns hens to living in cages. With Congress set to consider the Farm Bill shortly, please notify your U.S. Senators and Representatives that you oppose the Egg Products Inspection Act Amendments. Call them at (202) 224-3121. Urge them to oppose this legislation and briefly and clearly explain your reason.

Thank you for taking action.

To view Humane Farming Association’s animated video A Cage Is A Cage and learn more, please visit: StopTheRottenEggBill.org.

To learn more about enriched cages and why sanctuaries oppose them, see “Enriched” Cages for Egg-Laying Hens in the US and EU by United Poultry Concerns.

Thank you for everything you do for animals!

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Protest Wolves Losing Endangered Species Protection

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From IDA, In Defense of Animals

The United States Fish and Wildlife Services (USFWS) has announced a plan to delist all wolves throughout the United States (except Mexican wolves) who are currently protected by the Endangered Species Act. This reckless and politically motivated plan will intensify the ongoing slaughter of wolves. We have already seen tragedy in western states where hateful anti-wolf rhetoric and politics trump ethics and science.
When wolves lost their ESA protection in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, these states immediately began to allow a recreational slaughter. Wolves are being injured and killed by bow hunters, gunned down by trophy hunters, tortured by trappers in steel-jaw foothold traps and snares, and subjected to other brutal “management” methods, including aerial gunning. More than 1,100 wolves have been killed in these states since Congress took ESA protection away from them in 2011.
Has the human behavior that caused the endangerment of wolves and made necessary their protection changed? No! This question, not just numbers, should determine whether this species can afford to lose ESA protection. Wolves are still discriminated against and misunderstood, their role as important top carnivores for the integrity of ecosystems is not sufficiently valued, and they are hated by the livestock industry, ranchers and hunters.
Take action now:Don’t allow wolves to be delisted – they cannot afford it!
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Urge USDA to Confiscate Lucky from San Antonio Zoo

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The notorious Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) has reportedly approved the keeping of 53-year-old Lucky, a female Asian elephant, in solitary confinement at the San Antonio Zoo. This is in spite of the facts that
a) female elephants are extremely social and naturally live in close-knit multi-generational herds
b) there have been widespread protests from experts and members of the public alike
c) solitary confinement violates the AZA’s own guidelines, which require that elephants be kept in groups of three.
What you can do:Click here to read more. Then use the form at that link to tell Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack to intervene and confiscate Lucky. After you submit your letter, please follow up with a phone call to Sec. Vilsack: 202-720-3631.
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U.S. Bank supports Hundington Life Sciences – pull your account and tell them why!

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From all-creatures.org:

Originally Posted: April 24, 2013

Target U.S. Bank – HLS Lender, Investor In Cruelty

FROM Kinship Circle

ACTION

While Huntington Life Sciences (HLS) has teetered on the edge of shutdown, straddled with a $100 million debt, some financier always seems to bail them out.

Ask US Bank to end its association with HLS and terminate the current loan agreement.

Sign an online petition (copy/paste URL into your browser):

http://www.kinshipcircle.org/action_center/letter_new3.asp?LetterID=2004#autoletter

And/or better yet, make direct contact:

Go here for LOTS of direct contact information:
Downloadable PDF or go here: http://www.kinshipcircle.org/action_center/letter_new3.asp?LetterID=2004

INFORMATION / TALKING POINTS

US Bank loan lets HLS kill more animals

Huntingdon Life Sciences faced financial ruin. But US Bank’s $120 million loan kept them open to poison dogs, cats, monkeys and more animals in tests for pesticides, sweeteners, diet pills… So today animals still collapsed, frothing at the mouth. Dogs who didn’t get enough anesthesia “whimpered and moved” while cut apart.

US Bank is currently Huntingdon’s top debt-relief source. Though made aware of 7 investigations that reveal habitual animal abuse and fraudulent science, the bank approved this mega loan. Apparently US Bancorp doesn’t see animal cruelty as reason to blacklist a company, as it does with illegal gun sellers, gambling websites, etc. Like hundreds of other firms that dumped HLS, US Bank has access to footage and documents about techs who punch beagle puppies, dissect live animals, falsify data and botch experiments so badly that animals seize and die on the spot.

Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty UK launched a global campaign in 1999, with unified U.S. action a few years later. Anti-HLS efforts target the lab’s infrastructure: Financiers, customers and suppliers are strongly urged to dump HLS in ongoing letter/phone/email campaigns and live protests. Any company with ties to HLS is exposed to evidence of animal abuse.

Dear U.S. Bancorp Executive Officers and Employees,

It is refreshing to know that a corporation as large as U.S. Bancorp rejects business from illegal gun sellers, gambling websites, pornographers, and other enterprises judged corrupt or immoral.

Please add animal cruelty to your criterion for blacklisted companies. I was genuinely surprised to learn that U.S. Bank National Association approved a $120 million loan for Huntingdon-Life-Sciences. This controversial research laboratory, with facilities in England and New Jersey, is on record for: Multiple violations of animal welfare law in the United States and England, personnel cited for animal cruelty and on- site drug/alcohol use, and payoffs to the U.S. Agriculture Department for fraudulent records and animal welfare noncompliance.

Investigative footage that spans more than a decade shows animals who vomit, stagger, seize and collapse. Veterinary inspection is rare. H-L-S violence first went public when a UK Channel Four TV series, Countryside Undercover, broadcast reports from the lab’s Beagle Unit. A U.S. probe revealed dogs killed when dosing tubes misdirected into their lungs (rather then stomachs) choked them in poison. During post-mortem dissection, a tech cut apart the chest of a still conscious monkey. Another was filmed punching beagles: “A worker swung a puppy by the scruff of her neck…and continually punched her as she screamed,” the investigator noted.

In 2005, two H-L-S workers left their jobs distressed over suffering seen for 12 months. Their testimonials also described coworkers who “grab dogs by the scruff, shout and swear, swing and slap them.” They witnessed: Dogs barely anesthetized for painful procedures like bone marrow extraction; staff needle-jabbing contests; and routinely forged records to hide slip-ups.

In 2008, Animal Defenders International publicized H-L-S logs about inhalation tests with monkeys cinched in chairs to breathe in toxic fumes. The animals were so stressed, some suffered rectal prolapse and many self-mutilated to cope. One gnawed off an entire finger. Another shredded her face and had to eat via tube. Animals died in agony from collapsed or obstructed lungs.

Pharmaceutical firm Novartis withdrew sponsorship of an H-L-S study altogether, after disclosure of botched xenotransplantation tests in which pig hearts were stitched to the necks of hundreds of monkeys. The Daily Express exposed evidence of monkeys “screaming, reluctant to move, salivating, huddled with severe tremors on torso and head, collapsing, gasping.”

Biotechnology has evolved with breakthroughs in human-based methods relevant to human conditions. Conversely, animal tests mislead researchers due to metabolic, anatomic, physiological and psychological discrepancies between species. Erroneous animal data may speed new drugs through clinical trials to market, but lead to unforeseen adverse drug reactions in the general population. U.S. Food and Drug Administration lists ADRs as the fourth top cause of death, with over two million victims each year.

If a companion animal shares your home, you know how frightening pain is for your furry friend. The animals at H-L-S are no different, except pain is amplified. I urge you to join Royal Bank of Scotland, HSBC, Citibank, Bank of New York, Merrill Lynch, Charles Schwab, Barclays Plc, Stephens Inc. and hundreds more firms that severed relations with H-L-S. I encourage you to explore any cause-for-termination language in the current loan agreement as well.

I realize you may receive letters similar to mine, but these words accurately express my thoughts. Thank you for your valuable time. I look forward to any feedback you can provide.

Sincerely,

YOUR FULL NAME
ADDRESS, CITY, STATE
COUNTRY

Thank you for everything you do for animals!

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First Person Arrested Under Ag-Gag

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Twenty-five year old Amy Meyer was arrested and charged with violating Utah’s new “Ag Gag” bill that makes it illegal for citizens to record the abuse of animals.  262554_570497038429_549205_nShe went to the Smith Meatpacking Slaughterhouse in Draper, Utah, because she had heard that anyone could see what was going on right from the street. While she was there, she saw cows fighting to get away, a downer cow carried off on a tractor lift, and ground flesh being spewed from a chute on one side of the building. While filming this with her cell phone, she never set foot in the slaughterhouse area, and remained at all times on public property. She was arrested and charged with agricultural operation interference. She is to go to court on May 23rd. If convicted, she faces up to six months in jail. By the way….the Mayor of Draper, Darrell Smith, co-owns the slaughterhouse. But that wouldn’t have anything to do with anything, would it?

Please call the following people and express your support for Amy Meyer and slaughterhouse transparency. I am guessing you can think of many ways of expressing this. And then write two quick emails. Please try to stay respectful and polite — don’t make people remember our rudeness rather than our rightness. These are EASY CALLS. No one is going to start arguing with you (and do you care?) :-)

Utah Governor Herbert
Phone: (800) 705-2464

Draper Mayor Darrell Smith
Phone: (801) 576-6513

Draper City Prosecutor Ben Rasmussen
Phone: (801) 576-6545

Members of the Utah legislature
http://le.utah.gov/Documents/find.htm

Please call the Dale T. Smith and Sons Meat Packing Company and express your disapproval of their mistreatment of animals and their decision to press charges.
Phone: (801) 571-3611
mail@smithmeats.com

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Another Worthwhile Petition re Ag-Gag Legislation

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As you are aware, courageous undercover investigators have exposed and documented patterns of terrible abuse at numerous factory farms. These have led to recalls for food safety reasons as well as criminal convictions for animal cruelty. Instead of changing agribusiness, ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council, wants to criminalize anyone who brings animal abuse to light. (You can read more about ALEC at GreenIsTheNewRed.com — they are also behind efforts to weaken environmental protections and silence free speech online). They believe the factory farms should be left to regulate themselves, like toddlers in candy stores.

Ag-Gag bills have been introduced in nine states this year, and became law in three last year. They don’t just target undercover investigators, but other whistleblowers and journalists. Some of them criminalize anyone who even “possesses” or “distributes” photographs and YouTube videos. Under the model bill devised by Agribusiness and ALEC, investigators, whistleblowers, journalists and anyone who shares the footage they obtain are labeled terrorists.

Please write this oh-so-quick letter below, or a variation thereof, sign it, and send it to ALEC.

To:
ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council)
Ron Scheberle, Executive Director
John Eick, Legislative Analyst, Energy, Environment and Agriculture and Civil Justice Task Forces
Bill Meierling, Senior Director, Communications and Public Affairs
Stop bills that make it a crime to expose animal abuse on factory farms.Consumers have a right to make safe, healthy, and humane decisions about what we buy.

Sincerely,
[Your name]

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