Major Press Conference Called for Tuesday in DC on Pending Bill

Horseback Magazine

WASHINGTON, (HSUS) - Representatives from The Humane Society of the United States, members of Congress, celebrities and representatives from agriculture and the horse industry will speak at a press conference on Tuesday in support of the Prevention of Equine Cruelty Act (H.R. 503/S. 727), a federal bill to prohibit the trafficking in horses for slaughter of horses for human consumption and the export of horses for slaughter and human consumption. This outpouring of support comes just one week before the U.S. House Judiciary Committee’s Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security Subcommittee will hold a hearing on H.R. 503. Actors Kelly Carlson and Wendie Malick, both horse lovers and supporters of The HSUS, will be available following the press conference for interviews to speak out against this cruel practice.

 

The Prevention of Equine Cruelty Act of 2009 (H.R. 503/S. 727) was introduced by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind., Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., and Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., just days into the 111th Congress, to spare horses from being transported over the border to foreign slaughter plants. The legislation has garnered large, bipartisan cosponsor lists in both the House and Senate, and is poised for action. In 2009, more than 90,000 American horses were exported for slaughter—the majority shipped in long-distance transport to Mexico.

 

While there are currently no operational horse slaughter plants in the United States, tens of thousands of healthy, young American horses are still being trucked thousands of miles without food, water or rest to plants across the border into Mexico and Canada.

 

Documentation uncovered by horse welfare advocates demonstrates that the plants in the United States were equally inhumane and riddled with tremendous abuse. There is no humane way to slaughter horses for food consumption and Americans are horrified to find out that all kinds of American horses—former show horses, race horses, lesson ponies, even wild horses and heavily pregnant mares—meet this fate. Individuals who own horses must take responsibility for the proper care of their horses. If they cannot fulfill their basic obligation to provide lifetime care, then their options include adoption to new families, placement in equine sanctuaries or humane euthanasia.
"It is not humane euthanasia to transport a horse 1,000 miles to Mexico in an overcrowded cattle truck and then to kill the terrified animal by crude means at a foreign slaughter plant," said Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of The HSUS.