By Steven Long
HOUSTON, (Horseback) – The federal government says plans from a rookie Nebraska legislator to bring horsemeat processing to Nebraska are as dead as the severed horse hooves at a Mexican abattoir.“There is no possibility under the current law for a state-inspected meat plant to ship any meat, interstate or internationally, for human consumption,” said USDA spokesman Neil Gaffney told a Nebraska Newspaper.
As a bill is debated in the unicameral Nebraska legislature, the federal agency reiterated that federal law trumps state law, and to sell horse meat the product would have to have the imprimatur of federal meat inspectors. Congress years ago denied funding for the inspection of horse meat thereby applying a killing captive bolt to the horse processing industry in this country.
Nebraska is not alone in attempting to bring back the foreign owned industry that operated up to a few years ago in Texas and Illinois. Legislators are attempting to revive the industry in Montana, Wyoming, Missouri, and Illinois.
“There is no possibility under the current law for a state-inspected meat plant to ship any meat, interstate or internationally, for human consumption,” said USDA spokesman Neil Gaffney to the Journal Star newspaper
The bill is sponsored by Sen. Tyson Larson, an O’Neill, Nebraska Republican who would also force all horse rescue facilities to accept all horses that came to their door. The move would kill the humanitarian rescue movement in that state..
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