USDA abruptly purges animal welfare information from its website
Source: WaPo
The U.S. Department of Agriculture on Friday abruptly removed inspection reports and other information from its website about the treatment of animals at thousands of research laboratories, zoos, dog breeding operations and other facilities.
In a statement, the USDAs Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service cited court rulings and privacy laws for the decision, which it said was the result of a comprehensive review that took place over the past year. It said the removed documents, which also included records of enforcement actions against violators of the Animal Welfare Act and the Horse Protection Act, would now be accessible only via Freedom of Information Act Requests. Those can take years to be approved.
-snip-
The records that had been available were frequently used by animal welfare advocates to monitor government regulation of animal treatment at circuses, scientific labs and zoos. Journalists have used the documents to expose violations at universities.
Members of the public could also use the departments online database to search for information about dog breeders, as could pet stores. Seven states currently require pet stores to source puppies from breeders with clean USDA inspection reports, according to the Humane Society of the United States a requirement that could now be impossible to meet.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/animalia/wp/2017/02/03/the-usda-abruptly-removes-animal-welfare-information-from-its-website/
retrowire
(10,345 posts)I knew the vegan fight would get harder under Trump, I was just waiting for what it would be.
Son of a bitch.
C Moon
(12,227 posts)dalton99a
(81,709 posts)radical noodle
(8,020 posts)Follow them on twitter
https://twitter.com/altusda
Rhiannon12866
(207,016 posts)radical noodle
(8,020 posts)I hope a lot of people follow them. Twitter is now a better way to keep up with things. I resisted for long long but now I'm glad to be there. There's an amazing amount of support out there.
Rhiannon12866
(207,016 posts)I joined a long time ago, but never paid much attention. But when I started retweeting news articles, all of a sudden I started getting "followers," and it really is amazing, the anti-Trump movement is alive and well on Twitter! I've shared information from DU that's been pretty popular and now that we're seeing so much from Twitter being posted on DU it's really the way to go to keep up on things...
montana_hazeleyes
(3,424 posts)Animals need protection! They are helpless.
bdamomma
(63,978 posts)these are our terrorists .
They are striping us of everything. This the stench of Steve Bannon.
democratisphere
(17,235 posts)Animal abuse will rise but this must be stopped. Damn I loathe rethugs.
Bernardo de La Paz
(49,089 posts)manicraven
(901 posts)TeamPooka
(24,309 posts)JudyM
(29,294 posts)Judi Lynn
(160,707 posts)Equinox Moon
(6,344 posts)My heart breaks a few times each day.
SunSeeker
(51,827 posts)TomCADem
(17,390 posts)In the 1930s, the Nazi conducted ceremonial book burnings. The books targeted for burning were those viewed as being subversive or as representing ideologies opposed to Nazism. These included books written by Jewish, pacifist, Religious, classical liberal, anarchist, socialist, and communist authors, among others:
Today, scientific data is being systematically purged from numerous federal websites under the Trump regime.
dhill926
(16,393 posts)VERY motivated. And the concern for animals goes across party lines. this could get interesting...
JudyM
(29,294 posts)ally organized, like most rethug interest groups.
I do hope you are correct, though.
hamsterjill
(15,224 posts)At least in my own neck of the woods. I'd love to see us all come together under one strategy because, man, could we roar!!!
JudyM
(29,294 posts)conservatives are, because they could bring a powerful voice of morality into it.
radical noodle
(8,020 posts)but I've given up on them ever seeing trump for what he is.
nikibatts
(2,198 posts)And there were no humans left to protect them.
CottonBear
(21,598 posts)From Daily Kos:
You're kidding, right?
Trump's transition team gains a new member: The pro-puppy mills guy
Dec 14, 2016 9:00pm EST by Hunter
The Trump transition team, Department of Agriculture edition, has a new member. Because Donald Trump has so reliably surrounded himself with walking cartoons, it's Brian Klippenstein, executive director of far-right astroturf group Protect the Harvest.
The group is dedicated to fighting humane animal farming legislation, such as minimum cage sizes for pigs and chickensbut you almost certainly best know them from their vigorous defense of puppy mills.
Protect the Harvest's zeal to fight regulation of animal farming extends even to "puppy mills"large facilities that churn out dogs like factory farms churn out pigs. Back in 2010, the year Protect the Harvest was founded, it vigorously opposed a Missouri ballot measure to "require large-scale dog breeding operations to provide each dog under their care with sufficient food, clean water, housing and space; necessary veterinary care; regular exercise and adequate rest between breeding cycles," and to "prohibit any breeder from having more than 50 breeding dogs for the purpose of selling their puppies as pets."
Yep, that's right. One of the new focuses of a Trump-led Department of Agriculture may well be loosening the restrictions on ... puppy mills.
Walking cartoons, one and all.
http://m.dailykos.com/story/2016/12/15/1610638/-Trump-s-transition-team-gains-a-new-member-The-pro-puppy-mills-guy
myrna minx
(22,772 posts)dembotoz
(16,866 posts)Folks like their pets more than many family members
Gop hates doggies and. Well we know how they feel about pussy...
spiderpig
(10,419 posts)You can tell a lot about people by how they behave around animals.
He strikes me as the kind of psychotic who would pose smiling for a photo with your puppy and then, walking away, would say to his minion "shoot the dog".
Bayard
(22,257 posts)You can't trust a person that doesn't like animals.
The greatness of a nation can be judged by the way its animals are treated. - Mahatma Gandhi
Rhiannon12866
(207,016 posts)That used to be my signature here. I obviously need a new one, it's a good time to go back to that one...
Sunlei
(22,651 posts)Our "transparent" government is going away.
shenmue
(38,506 posts)johnp3907
(3,737 posts)Verbatim.