Uncategorized

Congress returns to Washington today after the election, and gets back to the business of the country. You’d think that first up on the Senate’s agenda today would be jobs, the economy, dealing with the fiscal cliff, or even climate change. But instead, the very first item on the Senate’s lame-duck calendar is something really important to the American people: importing 41 polar bear heads and hides from Canada so they can adorn the trophy rooms of wealthy big-game hunters.

It’s the South’s last legal blood sport, and in Virginia, it’s under serious examination. It’s time for legislators to get serious about ridding this country of fox penning. 

As we enter the final stretch of the 112th Congress, HSLF is posting a preview of our 2012 Humane Scorecard. In this preliminary report, we evaluate lawmakers’ performance on animal protection issues by scoring a number of key votes, but also their support for adequate funding for the enforcement of animal welfare laws, and their cosponsorship of priority bills.

Congress passed the Horse Protection Act of 1970 aiming to eliminate the cruel practice of “soring” show horses—applying caustic chemicals to their hooves and legs, inserting sharp objects, and using other painful techniques to force an artificially high-stepping gait, a form of cheating that gives those who engage in this abuse a competitive edge over owners and trainers who do not.

The 74th annual Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration began this week in Shelbyville, Tenn., and the jury is still out on whether the industry will make good on its promises to improve treatment of show horses in the wake of shocking undercover investigations revealing cruelty by one of the biggest names in the world of

U.S. Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, has been under fire in the past week for his campaign to defeat legislation that would strengthen the federal animal fighting law by making it a crime to attend or take a child to a dogfight or cockfight.

There’s a lot of attention to the age-old conflict between cats and birds this week, with the release of a new study of cat predation on native wildlife species. The limited study tracked only a few dozen cats (less than one feline subject for every million pet cats in the U.S.) but found that a majority of kitties in the group did not stalk, chase, or kill any songbirds or other wild animals while they were roaming outdoors.

Boosters of horse slaughter have been venue shopping—from Missouri to New Mexico—in their bizarre attempt to re-open equine abattoirs on American soil. When horse slaughter plants previously operated in the U.S. they were typically a blight on their communities, causing housing prices in nearby areas to decline and local economies to suffer. So far, no community in the nation wants to be known as the one that is killing Mr. Ed

It’s not uncommon for Washington lobbying groups to set up phony organizations that sound like they are advocating in the public interest, rather than for corporate special interests.

The U.S. Senate tonight voted in favor of an amendment to the Farm Bill, introduced by Sen. David Vitter, R-La., to make it a federal crime to attend a dogfight or cockfight, and a felony to bring a child to an animal fight. The vote was an overwhelming 88 to 11.