Children are taught to care, to look out for others, and to do what’s right—and it is TIME for the government to reflect those values by passing the SAFE Act.

 

Hello, we are a group of child animal advocates asking you to support the SAFE Act (Save America’s Forgotten Equines Act), a law that would ban horse slaughter for human consumption in the U.S. and stop the transport, sale, and campaign of horses being sent across borders to be slaughtered. In our Animal Advocates group, we heard about the way many horses are discarded after they are of no use to humans and it became instantly obvious that this is the animal cruelty topic that we, as a group, are incredibly passionate about and want to help stop. We are raising our voices in hopes that you will raise your voice with us!

 

Horses don’t just “help people”, they form lifelong bonds, show intelligence and emotion, and stand beside us as partners, companions, and even healers. They have worked alongside humans for generations, on farms, in sports, pulling carriages, and supporting people through every part of life, quietly there for us in ways that matter, through the moments we feel strong and the ones we don’t. And yet, when their bodies wear down, when they are no longer fast enough, strong enough, or profitable enough, many are discarded. Not retired. Not protected. Sold.   

 

The SAFE ACT has been introduced and discussed many times for over a decade, yet, despite being the right action to take, not enough as been done to pass it and put it into law.  If the SAFE Act became law: 

Horses would not be allowed to be slaughtered in the United States for human consumption

Horses would not be allowed to be shipped to Canada or Mexico to be slaughtered

Horses would not longer be exploited in this system/manner for profit

 

Right now, without the SAFE Act in place, horses, both wild and domestic, are caught in a system known as the slaughter pipeline. Wild horses are rounded up from their homes and separated from their families, often ending up in holding systems or auctions where their futures are uncertain. Domestic horses face an even harsher reality: they leave their homes and place of safety and are shipped from auction to auction, confused, exhausted, and terrified, increasing the chances that they will be bought by "kill buyers" and sent across borders to be slaughtered. This includes retired racehorses, carriage and buggy horses, therapy horses, and even former pets-many with former owners who could no longer keep their horse and would be devastated and distraught to know this is how their beloved horse ended up. 

 

One of those horses caught in this pipeline was  Enya, a retired harness racer. She worked her entire life for people, racing when she was young, then pulling a buggy, and being bred to produce a foal. When she was no longer useful, she was removed from her foal and shipped through multiple auctions for much of a year until she ended up in a kill pen, just days away from slaughter. When she was found, she was bleeding from her leg, likely having been injured during transport or in the pen, and received no proper care until someone paid to get her off of the "ship to slaughter list" and placed into a home where she was tended to.  Four years later, she still carries the scar physically and emotionally.

 

Another example is Winnie, a tiny pony advertised as a one year old and days away from shipping to slaughter. After being transported out, she became severely ill with shipping fever (pleuropneumonia), a serious bacterial respiratory infection caused by stress from transport, leading to fever, coughing, lethargy, and nasal discharge. She was later believed to be only about six months old, a baby already caught in this system. These are only two of the estimated 20,000 horses sent to slaughter each year.

 

Even when horses are not in official slaughter pens, many dealers who buy these horses from auction act as middlemen and advertise horses to rescuers and concerned citizens across the country as “shipping soon” or “at risk.” These horses often become shipped around and sick while they await a caring rescuer to step in and if one does not, they get sold to kill buyers or at another auction.  Without the SAFE Act, this system continues unchecked and horses go without proper care and safety for far too long. 

 

For those looking for an example: Here is one way a horse may get stuck in this cruel system we are allowing to happen: An owner can no longer keep a horse and gives them to someone they thought they could trust.  That person decides they do not want the horse and sends them to auction. The horse is bought cheaply by a kill buyer or middleman. The horse is then advertised as "urgent-shipping to slaughter soon" and either kind people donate or pay to save the horse and that money is used by the "kill buyer" to go back and buy more horses, or the horse is one of the unluckiest ones and doesn't get a chance to be saved because he gets tucked into the direct ship pens, shipping directly to slaughter. The cycle repeats—over and over again.

 

This system continues because money is being made. "Kill buyers" and horse dealers profit, while horses suffer. Many lives are lost, and many more endure pain and fear to fill the pockets of a few. Rescues are trapped in an impossible position. They spend countless hours fundraising and saving horses, only to watch empty kill pens fill right back up again. They must choose between continuing to rescue—knowing the system will keep going—or stopping and leaving these hardworking, loving, life-deserving horses to be shipped to their deaths. So they keep going, because how do you walk away from a life in front of you? Someone's once best friend?  But how many hours, how many donations, how many emotional pleas does it take to keep trying to outrun a system designed to keep repeating itself?

 

For those of you who have been lucky enough to meet a horse you know they are uniquely different, just like people.   Horses are highly sensitive, intelligent, social animals with a well-developed ability to read and respond to others. Research shows they can recognize human facial expressions, remember individual people, and adjust their behavior based on a person’s emotional state. Horses and humans can exhibit physiological co-regulation, where heart rate patterns and stress levels become in sync to humans or their herd.  Most importantly, they feel deeply.  Shipping these deeply feeling, highly sensitive horses all over the country after they lost their home and family/herd, forcing them onto trucks exhausted, scared, and hungry, for an unidentified amount of time all before they are sentenced to a death they do not deserve is not only wrong but it is cruel. Despite guidelines for humane slaughter, in there final months, days, and moments there are real risks of prolonged stress, fear, and pain, especially during transport and handling.   If the final stunning is not done correctly it can lead to a painful death.  The final moments do not take place in America and are beyond our country's ability to regulate or enforce.  Therefore , we are sending our nation's beloved and majestic horses to die a fate determined by another country. Our country evolved and grew to protect our beloved dogs and cats from this type of fate, it's far overdue that horses are added to this list of protected pets too.  As children, we should not have to carry the burden of understanding and speaking out against practices that allow horses from the United States to be sent to other countries for slaughter.

 

And we have to ask—why is this being left to rescues and everyday people to fix? Why does it take exhausted, good-hearted people to keep trying to stop this cycle? Why are us kids having to even make this petition when this is so clearly cruelty and animal abuse at its worst.   Why isn’t our government stopping it? Who is gaining from this? And is the gain worth the suffering of so many amazing souls or the loss of such future potential? Many of the horses saved from this pipeline, like Winnie or Enya, go on to live long lives where they bring so much good to the world and their humans.  Some go on to become therapeutic horses with their years of training and amazing temperaments, others go on to live long healthy lives they would have otherwise been denied, and others continue with shows, jumping, or just being an amazing companion horse.  Yet, at the same time so many resources are wasted to spare them from a position they never should have been in in the first place and there are so many others that are never offered this same chance. It is such a pointless practice and we are smarter than this.  Solving a problem by creating a bigger problem is something we have always been taught not to do, yet this practice is doing just that. 

 

The SAFE Act would stop this cycle by making it illegal to sell and transport horses for slaughter. Instead of funding an endless pipeline, resources could go toward real solutions—care, rehabilitation, responsible ownership, and humane end-of-life decisions.

 

As kids, we are taught to be kind, to protect the vulnerable, and to do the right thing. Passing the SAFE Act is a chance for adults to lead by example.

 

Please sign this petition and support the SAFE Act.

Help end the sale and shipment of horses to slaughter.
Help stop the system.
Help protect horses.

Say NEIGH to cruelty.

 

Sincerely,

 

The Animal Advocates (Grades 3-6)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Less than a year old, this is Winnie after being "bailed" and saved from her "kill pen" destination, only to become extremely sick from the stress of her transport and relocations, which only occurred because of this horrible practice of horses being put at risk for slaughter or becoming victim to slaughter if they are not "saved" in time.

 

 

 

 

 

These are photos of Enya in quarantine the day she was bailed from the "kill pen".  She is thin and her leg is injured, both common ways animals suffer in this horrible practice.

 

 

 

 

It is hard to believe this is Enya the year before entering the slaughter pipeline.

 

 

 

 

 

Enya, finally settling into her new forever home, just barely escaping with her life, after so much pointless suffering.