Equine Welfare Alliance
Okay, folks. It's time to start pressing for the defunding language in the Appropriations bill. There will be a house amendment to add the language back in the bill. It is up to all of us to make sure it gets passed and and the language stays in the senate bill.
The subcommittee mark-up was supposed to be Wednesday (not sure if that happened). Most likely the full committee mark-up will be the week of June 18 (they are in recess next week).
This is also a time be very careful what you post on public sites and forums. While you can reach many people, if it's public, our opponents can read it as well. Never reveal your strategy!
It is time to reach out to all committee members - best method is fax or phone call: http://appropriations.house.gov/About/Members/.
The following members supported us the last session. It is important to thank them and get their support for this session. If any of the below reps are from your district, be sure to give them a personal call.
Ken Calvert - CA 44
Ander Crenshaw - FL 4
Charles Dent - PA 15
Mario Diaz-Balart - FL 21
Rodney Frelinghuysen - NJ 11
Steve LaTourette - OH 14
Frank Wolf - VA 10
Bill Young - FL 10
Please be brief with your comments and don't go off on tangents. Remember this is a financial bill and giving them gory details about slaughter isn't going to win points. Be prepared to discuss your talking points. A few talking points to consider:
- We don't slaughter non-food animals and we don't use slaughter as a disposal service. It is for food production. Horses are not raised or regulated as food animals and the dangers of meat from US horses have been documented over and over again. Canada has already started rejecting TBs because they are traceable. That speaks volumes.
There are many source documents posted on our horse slaughter page that you can link to:
Feel free to use material and/or talking points from presentations on this page:
- If they bring up the GAO report, remind them that the GAO also recommended banning slaughter and there is no data to back their anecdotal comments. The committee that requested the study refused to release the data (most likely because there isn't any). Feel free to use our analysis:
Executive summary:
- Remind them that there are limited funds to inspect our traditional food sources and that is more important to this country than inspecting meat that we do not consume, that is not safe for consumption and will be exported to unsuspecting consumers. If slaughter resumes in this country, it is likely to give our meat industry a black eye (if they don't care about what they're exporting, what does that say about our own food sources)
- The cost of horse slaughter is much more far reaching than just the cost of inspections. There must be a national passport system that will cost all taxpayers as well as a financial burden on horse owners by having a veterinarian record all meds administered to the horse and the cost of the program. There are litigation expenses as history has proven. Plants don't pay fines without challenging them in court. There is the cost of wastewater cleanup, devalued property values and loss of new business in the community.
- Abandoned horses: Most are horses that were rejected by the plants. The starving, neglected, old, infirm, lame and dangerous horses are not the horses going to slaughter according the USDA and Temple Grandin.
Again, please stay on topic and let us know if you need information on anything.
Start calling now and don't stop until the bill passes in both horses. It's now or never folks. We have people in congress that are counting on your calls to back them up. Don't let them down and most importantly, don't let our horses down.
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