LIVE FEED ON SATURDAY FEB. 7TH 3PM With John Holland (Senior Analyst for AAHS) and Paula Bacon and Laura Allen!

Saving America's Horses on WFL Endangered Stream Live, Talk Radio for the Protection of Animals

The Hidden Cruelty of Horse Slaughter and the Fight for Federal Support to Make it Stop.

Host Katia Louise interviews an expert panel of guests on the continuing sordid practice of horse slaughter as currently sustained by the United States. Horses suffer unimaginable cruel treatment in the process of their transport out of the US to Mexico and Canada where they experience barbaric slaughter. Listeners will learn the truth about one of America's darkest secrets and how to take action to stop this cruel and rapidly growing business of exports through the support of current, yet disregarded bills lingering in Congress for the past 8 years. 

Guests include Paula Bacon representing Americans Against Horse Slaughter and as former mayor of Kaufman TX, she helped to shut down the Dallas Crown, a US horse slaughter plant now operating in Mexico, among the worst malign abusers of cruelty in this brutal practice. Also joining us is the renown author on the issue of horse slaughter, John Holland; senior analyst for Americans Against Horse Slaughter. Holland has authored and coauthored studies on the relationship of horse slaughter to the rate of abuse and neglect in horses and has written dozens of articles on the subject of horse slaughter and its politics. Plus we have Animal Law Attorney, Laura Allen of the Animal Law Coalition who's been fiercely active in the support of getting legislature passed for the Prevention of the Equine Cruelty. These panelists are fighting to abolish horse slaughter and the export of horses for slaughter with support more stringent enforcement of laws to prevent abuse and neglect.

Call-in number: (646) 727- 2170. Calls will be accepted live during the show.  The chat room at the show's WFL Endangered Stream Live Blog Talk Radio page will be open throughout the broadcast for simultaneous discussion and to help answer questions.  Registered listeners may connect and talk straight from their computer from anywhere in the world.  (learn more) 

Listen live on Saturday, Feb 7th at 3pm (PST) at WFL Endangered Stream Live Blog Talk Radio.
Listen anytime on demand. 


Links:
http://wflendangeredstreamlive.org/showlineup.html

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/wflendangeredstreamlive/2009/02/07/Saving-Americas-Horses

IMMEDIATE ACTION NEEDED!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

 

BILL TO END HORSE SLAUGHTER REINTRODUCED

 

Washington, DC (January 15, 2009) – The Prevention of Equine Cruelty Act (H.R. 503), was reintroduced yesterday by House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) and Representative Dan Burton (R-IN).  They first introduced the bill, which will ban horse slaughter, in the summer of 2008.  It gained quick bipartisan support and passed out of the Judiciary Committee but did not move further as the legislative clock wound down.  Committed to seeing the measure passed into law, Chairman Conyers has given the bill priority in his committee, as signaled by its reintroduction so early on the legislative calendar.  With sixty-one original cosponsors, the bill already enjoys strong bipartisan support.

 

Although the few remaining horse slaughter plants operating in the US were shut down in 2007 under state law, the absence of a federal law banning the practice means that American horses are still at risk of being slaughtered for human consumption.  In fact, more than 100,000 horses were exported to Mexico and Canada in 2008 for slaughter; In Canada horses are often shot to death while in Mexico some plants still use the “puntilla” knife to stab the horse into a state of paralysis prior to being slaughtered while still fully conscious.  The meat is then sold to high-end consumers in Europe and Asia.

 

“There are naysayers who claim we should reopen the US plants rather than seek to ban all horse slaughter.  Clearly, they’ve already forgotten how awful the plants here were,” said Chris Heyde, deputy director of Government and Legal Affairs for the Animal Welfare Institute.

 

Documents recently released under the Freedom of Information Act reveal just how brutal conditions were at the US plants before they were shut down.  Hundreds of graphic photographs taken by U.S. Department of Agriculture employees at one plant show live horses with missing legs, with eyeballs hanging out, with skin ripped from the body and the birth of foals at the plant.  Other photos show horses dead on arrival, having succumbed to the miseries of transport. 

 

“The suffering of hundreds of thousands of our horses rests solely on the shoulders of those blocking this bill.  Were it not for their stalling tactics horse slaughter would have ceased years ago.  Meanwhile an American horse is slaughtered every five minutes.  We commend Chairman Conyers and Representative Burton for taking the lead once again to end this cruel practice through introduction of H.R. 503, the Prevention of Equine Cruelty Act,” said Heyde.

 

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