Articles About Government Affairs

Once again, we are forced to highlight the abysmal state of enforcement of the Animal Welfare Act (AWA) and the Horse Protection Act (HPA) in recent years. As made plain by the graphs on this...

The Horse Protection Act (HPA) was enacted in 1970 to clamp down on the scourge of “soring”—the term for a host of abusive practices inflicted upon Tennessee walking horses and related breeds to produce an...

After years of delay, NOAA Fisheries released a proposed rule in December 2020 to reduce the number of North Atlantic right whales killed by gear in northeast lobster and Jonah crab fisheries. More than 900,000...

The American Rescue Plan Act, signed on March 11 in response to the COVID-19 crisis, contains funding to address public health risks resulting from the exploitation of animals. The law allocates $300 million to the...

The 117th Congress got underway in January, and a number of AWI-supported animal welfare bills were reintroduced within the first few weeks. Among them are the Preventing Future Pandemics Act, which would prohibit the import...

The lights were just about to be turned out on 2020 when Congress finally wrapped up its spending bill for the 2021 fiscal year, which had begun on October 1. Thanks to the hard work...

For over 50 years, birds have been denied protection under the Animal Welfare Act (AWA). Twenty years ago, the animal welfare community won a lawsuit against the US Department of Agriculture challenging this exclusion. Since...

On September 29, the House of Representatives passed the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act (HR 1754) by voice vote. Led by Representatives Paul Tonko (D-NY) and Andy Barr (R-KY), the bill would crack down on...

One of the stark realities COVID-19 has forced us to confront is the huge risk posed by zoonotic diseases—pathogens passed from nonhuman animals to humans. COVID is merely the latest and most devastating example of...

With a new administration taking the helm in January, we can expect an end to the damaging wildlife and environmental policies that have unfortunately been a hallmark of the current administration (see page 2). The...