Advocacy Group Criticizes Federal Advisory Board for Mustang Slaughter Proposal
Grand Junction, Colorado (October 19, 2017) – Today, the American Wild Horse Conservation (formerly American Wild Horse Campaign) criticized the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) National Wild Horse and Burro Advisory Board for making recommendations that could lead to the mass roundup and slaughter of America's wild horses and burros.
The board recommended that the BLM remove over 46,000 wild horses from the range over the next three years to meet the agency's population limits. They also suggested that the BLM destroy healthy 'excess' wild horses and burros or sell them for slaughter, and phase out long-term holding pastures for wild horses. When asked about the fate of the 32,146 horses currently housed in those pastures, board member Ben Masters stated, 'They would be destroyed.'
This marks the first time the board has targeted wild horses living freely on public lands. If adopted, the recommendation could lead to the mass destruction of America's mustangs, potentially through aerial gunning.
'The Board’s recommendations are against the will of the 80 percent of Americans who oppose killing and slaughtering our wild horses and want these iconic animals protected on America’s public lands,' said Suzanne Roy, Executive Director of the American Wild Horse Conservation. 'This board is supposed to represent stakeholders in the wild horse management debate, but the biggest stakeholder – the American public – has been left out in the cold, along with any science that does not support the pro-slaughter agenda.'
At the meeting, AWHC, joined by its coalition partner The Cloud Foundation, presented a petition signed by 300,000 citizens opposing the Board’s previous recommendation to kill and slaughter wild horses made at its 2016 meeting. The groups support managing wild horses humanely on the range with humane fertility control, as recommended by the National Academy of Sciences, as an alternative to roundup and slaughter.
Just over a year ago, the Board made a similar recommendation to kill horses in holding facilities, sparking international public outrage. In response, the BLM issued a statement saying that it would not accept the lethal recommendation. However, the Trump Administration’s Fiscal Year 2018 budget requests that Congress lift longstanding prohibitions on destroying healthy wild horses and burros and selling them for slaughter.
According to AWHC, the push for mustang slaughter is being orchestrated by a small but powerful special interest group that views wild horses as competition for cheap, taxpayer-subsidized grazing on public lands.
'The American people and our cherished wild horses and burros deserve better than a sham Advisory Board and an inhumane government policy that’s opposed by 80 percent of Americans,' Roy concluded. 'The public lands and the wild horses who inhabit them belong to all Americans and all Americans should have a say in their management.'
The American Wild Horse Conservation (formerly American Wild Horse Campaign) is dedicated to preserving the American wild horse in viable, free-roaming herds for generations to come, as part of our national heritage. Its grassroots mission is endorsed by a coalition of more than 60 horse advocacy, humane, and public interest organizations.