Slaughter of 90,000 Wild Horses Could Proceed

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Slaughter of 90,000 Wild Horses Could Proceed

Postby seemslikeadream » Sun Nov 19, 2017 1:43 am

Slaughter of 90,000 Wild Horses Could Proceed Despite 80% Objection From American Public

The American Wild Horse Campaign on Thursday harshly criticized Interior Sec. Ryan Zinke's appointment of Brian Steed, the former chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Chris Stewart (R-UT), as the acting director of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) as dangerous and out of step with the wishes of the vast majority of Americans.

"Rep. Stewart is leading the charge to slaughter America's wild horses and burros over the opposition of 80 percent of Americans," said Suzanne Roy, AWHC Executive Director. "Putting his deputy at the helm of the agency charged with protecting these national icons is like putting the wolf in charge of the chicken coop."

"Americans don't want the government to be in the horse slaughter business, and Interior Secretary Zinke should appoint someone to lead the Bureau of Land Management who is committed to protecting, not destroying, America's historic mustangs," Roy concluded.

Roy added that the long-term leadership for this agency, which manages 245 million acres of public land in the West, should be determined through a full and transparent confirmation process, not a late-in-the-day political appointment by the secretary.

In July, the U.S. House of Representatives issued what AWHC called a "death warrant" when it passed the "Stewart Amendment" to a 2018 spending bill that would allow for the destruction of wild horses and burros the BLM considers to be surplus. The Senate has yet to weigh in on the subject, but if it concurs, the amendment could lead to the killing of more than 90,000 wild horses on the range and in holding facilities.




Stewart and Zinke are pushing for the destruction of America's mustangs to appease the special interest livestock lobby, which views wild horses as competition for cheap taxpayer subsidized grazing on public lands. (Public lands ranchers pay $1.87 per animal per month to graze livestock on public lands while the going rate for private land grazing in the West is $22.60.)

Livestock industry groups like the National Cattleman's Association are lobbying for the killing and slaughter of wild horses and burros on public lands even though 80 percent of BLM land grazed by livestock has no wild horses present on it.

AWHC is calling on Congress to reject the Stewart amendment in favor of appropriations language that would require the BLM to use non-lethal birth control to manage America's wild herds, as recommended by the National Academy of Sciences. The Senate is expected to release its 2018 Interior Appropriations bill later this month.
https://www.ecowatch.com/wild-horses-zi ... 1-85986361
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
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Re: Slaughter of 90,000 Wild Horses Could Proceed

Postby seemslikeadream » Sun Nov 26, 2017 11:29 am

Will a Senate bill save thousands of wild horses, burros from being euthanized?

File photo by Frank Bellino, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG Wild horses rescued by the Wild for Life Foundation that was roaming on federal lands have a new home at the Wild Horse Foundation’s facility in Ramona in this July file photo. Unlike a House bill that allows wild horses to be killed, a Senate spending bill calls for “humane and politically viable options” to control the wild horse population.
By JEFF HORSEMAN | jhorseman@scng.com | The Press-Enterprise

PUBLISHED: November 24, 2017 at 11:48 am | UPDATED: November 24, 2017 at 12:55 pm
Advocates for wild horses and burros are lauding a U.S. Senate spending bill they say would spare thousands of mustangs on public lands from being killed.

An explanatory statement on the Senate Appropriations Committee’s $32.6 billion Interior spending bill for fiscal 2018, released Nov. 20, calls for “humane and politically viable options” to deal with wild horse overpopulation on federal land. A similar bill passed by the House Appropriations Committee in July allows horses to be euthanized as a means of population control.

The House and Senate bills will have to be reconciled in talks between lawmakers from both chambers, and it’s unclear whether long-standing federal prohibitions against the killing or sale for slaughter of wild horses will make the final budget.

Still, wild horse advocates say the Senate bill offers a fighting chance for the animals’ survival.

“The Senate has heard the voice of the Americans loud and clear and rejected the killing of our nation’s iconic wild horses and burros,” Suzanne Roy, executive director of the American Wild Horse Campaign, said in a news release.

“America’s mustangs are part of the history and culture of the West. Clearly, the Senate realizes that killing America’s mustangs or selling them for slaughter is not acceptable to the American public. The only humane and politically viable path forward is to use birth control to manage wild populations on the range, as recommended by the National Academy of Sciences.”

The Senate bill is the latest development in an emotional debate over wild horses and burros roaming millions of acres in the West.

Officials with the federal Bureau of Land Management have said that the current wild horse population, estimated at 73,000, is more than the land can sustain and the population doubles every four years and that not enough horses are being adopted to keep pace with population growth.


Wild horse rescue group fighting to save horses
SCNG


The BLM has been rounding up wild horses and burros and holding them indefinitely in off-range facilities. According to the BLM, close to $50 million of the wild horse program’s $80 million budget is spent caring for the 46,000 horses in those facilities and the program’s budget has quadrupled since 2000.

Cattle ranchers whose herds graze on federal land argue the horses compete with livestock for grazing and threaten the ecological balance of public lands. The Trump administration also supported lifting the ban on euthanasia.

Reacting to the Senate bill, Ethan Lane, executive director of the Public Lands Council, which represents ranchers with grazing permits on public lands, said: “The need to responsibly manage these animals grows daily as this population and the ensuing animal welfare crisis continues to explode.”

During a House appropriations hearing this summer, Rep. Chris Stewart, R-Utah, held up a photo of an emaciated horse while arguing it was cruel to let horses on public lands starve to death because there are too many horses and not enough food.

Stewart offered an amendment to the House spending bill for the Department of the Interior that opened the door to euthanasia. The amendment, which passed by voice vote, had the support of Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Corona, who chairs the appropriations panel in charge of interior funding.

“The reality on our federal lands is that the status quo is not working for our wild horses and it’s not working for taxpayers,” Calvert said at the time.

Wild horse advocates condemned the House bill, with Roy calling it “a death warrant for America’s mustangs” that “will lead to the wholesale destruction of these irreplaceable national treasures.”

Rather than kill the horses or sell them to slaughterhouses, advocates called for more funding of research for horse birth control. They also take issue with the idea that horses are starving due to overpopulation.
http://www.pe.com/2017/11/24/will-a-sen ... hanized-2/
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
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Re: Slaughter of 90,000 Wild Horses Could Proceed

Postby seemslikeadream » Wed Jan 31, 2018 12:11 pm

Group Sues to Stop Roundup of 10,000 Wild Horses

Animal rights group Friends of Animals has filed a lawsuit over a planned wild horse roundup in Nevada.

The suit was filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Reno, the Associated Press reported. It claims that the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) violated the National Environmental Policy Act and other laws by approving the removal of nearly 10,000 mustangs over 10 years in a 4,900-square-mile expanse of federal rangeland near the Nevada-Utah border.

Michael Harris, director of the group's Wildlife Law Program in Colorado, said the roundups could occur without public notice or comment and without site-specific analysis of each individual gather.

The "roundup decision is unprecedented in size and scope," the suit states, and would allow BLM to "continually roundup, remove, drug and castrate wild horses for 10 years after the initial roundup."

Friends of Animals President Priscilla Feral told the AP that castration puts male horses at risk of hemorrhaging and infection, and those that survive the process "will be robbed of their natural behaviors, putting them at a disadvantage on the range in terms of survival."

"This is the definition of animal cruelty," Feral added. "These are wild animals, not domesticated dogs and cats."

BLM District Manager Jill Silvey authorized the gathers in December.

"Native vegetative communities in parts of the complexes have already crossed critical ecological thresholds that could prevent or significantly slow their recovery," she said at the time. "This resource degradation and potential for irreversible ecological damage will continue without immediate action to remove excess wild horses and to bring the wild horse population back to (appropriate management levels.)"

But the group contends that the roundups are based on outdated population targets adopted in management plans that have not been updated for more than a decade.
https://www.ecowatch.com/wild-horses-ne ... 2-85986361
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
User avatar
seemslikeadream
 
Posts: 32090
Joined: Wed Apr 27, 2005 11:28 pm
Location: into the black
Blog: View Blog (83)


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