Kicked, beaten, exposed to extreme temperatures and weather—all too often, animals in slaughter plants are severely mistreated before they are killed. In many cases, such incidents could be prosecuted under state animal cruelty laws, but the US Department of Agriculture does little to notify or encourage action by state law enforcement officials.
Even when state prosecutors become aware of such abuse, they sometimes choose not to act, under the mistaken belief that the USDA has exclusive jurisdiction. As a result, state criminal charges have rarely been brought for abuse of livestock (e.g., cattle, pigs) at slaughter, and never, that AWI is aware of, for mistreatment of poultry in federal slaughterhouses.
To correct this, AWI worked with Animal Partisan, another animal protection organization, to petition the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) to take two actions: first, to issue a public notice clarifying the circumstances under which federal laws such as the Federal Meat Inspection Act (FMIA) and Poultry Products Inspection Act (PPIA) preclude enforcement of state animal cruelty laws and when they do not; second, that FSIS personnel more effectively communicate and cooperate with state officials in the enforcement of animal cruelty laws applicable to animals at slaughter.
The petition acknowledges the complex interplay between federal slaughter inspection and state animal cruelty laws. Under the US Constitution, federal law is the “supreme law of the land”; where state and federal laws conflict, federal law normally governs (i.e., “preempts” state law). In addition, the FMIA and the PPIA contain specific preemption clauses that prohibit states from imposing certain additional or different requirements on slaughterhouses. Consequently, the application of some state animal cruelty laws to the treatment of animals at slaughter may be precluded.
Courts have made clear, however, that these complexities do not categorically exclude animals in slaughterhouses from all state-level protections. The key determinant is whether Congress intended to preempt state law. This intent is typically demonstrated by either an express preemption clause (specifying what state protections are—and by exclusion are not—foreclosed) or by a regulatory scheme so comprehensive that it’s clearly intended to be exclusive.
In 2012, for example, the US Supreme Court found that a California law requiring nonambulatory pigs (those unable to stand or walk) to be euthanized rather than processed for slaughter was expressly barred by the FMIA’s preemption provision that prohibited additional or different state requirements “with respect to premises, facilities and operations.” Yet the court noted that a state law imposing the same requirements as the FMIA would not be preempted by this language—allowing state enforcement when federal action is absent. As the court explained, “States may exact civil or criminal penalties for animal cruelty or other conduct that also violates the FMIA. … Although the FMIA preempts much state law involving slaughterhouses, it thus leaves some room for the States to regulate.”
In 2017, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals illuminated another scenario in which a state animal welfare law could escape preemption. The court ruled that a different California statute—this one prohibiting the force feeding of birds to produce foie gras—was not preempted because the PPIA did not expressly bar such a regulation. The court found, rather, that the PPIA “contemplates extensive state involvement” because it explicitly allows states to impose certain poultry inspection requirements. Moreover, the California law “does not stand as an obstacle to accomplishing the PPIA’s purposes.” Thus, the force-feeding prohibition was not precluded.
This latter ruling affirmed the fact that—notwithstanding the existence of federal slaughter laws—states can enforce animal cruelty laws in a number of slaughter-related situations. It also offered a clear indication that states may actually have more room to safeguard the welfare of poultry than they have for livestock. This is because, compared to the FMIA (which incorporates the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act, and thus contains a number of humane handling requirements for livestock at slaughter), the PPIA imposes very few requirements relating to the humane treatment of poultry processed for slaughter, and it permits state restrictions in a number of settings.
Because of the broader leeway afforded state laws protecting poultry, and because of the vast number of birds slaughtered each year (about 9.7 billion in 2023, compared to about 160 million cattle, hogs, and other mammals), AWI submitted comments in support of the Animal Partisan petition that emphasized the especially urgent need for the FSIS to take action regarding the mistreatment of poultry in slaughter plants.
Our comments described examples spanning the last two decades of atrocious handling of chickens, turkeys, and ducks in slaughter facilities, including live birds having their heads, legs, and wings ripped off; being stomped to death or run over by vehicles; and being buried alive under piles of other birds in trash bins and condemn barrels. Unknown thousands of other birds entered scald tanks while still breathing, leaving them to drown in filthy, scalding water.
We explained that—despite the critical importance of investigating such incidents for potential violations of state animal cruelty laws—the FSIS appears to have done next to nothing to communicate such incidents to law enforcement. For example, each year from 2014 through 2022, hundreds of US slaughter plants collectively processed billions of birds. To AWI’s knowledge, during this entire period the only steps the FSIS took to notify states of egregious instances of abuse were to issue 13 “letters of concern”—slaps on the wrist that carried no legal consequence and were addressed to state veterinarians or state boards of animal health; none were sent to law enforcement or prosecution offices.
The FSIS must do more to protect both poultry and livestock. It should start by clarifying that the FMIA and PPIA do not prevent local law enforcement and prosecution offices from enforcing state animal cruelty statutes when they are not in fact preempted by federal law, and by further clarifying the circumstances where state action is permitted. The agency must also call out cruelty when it sees it, by significantly improving and increasing its communication with state officials and notifying them when potential criminal mistreatment occurs.