Don't let megacorps roll back animal protection laws

In California, 63% of voters said farm animals shouldn't live in cages so small they can't turn around. The industry sued to kill the law and rode it all the way to the Supreme Court — and lost there too. The law stood. Democracy worked.

So the lobbyists changed venues. Buried in the Farm Bill is something called the "Save Our Bacon Act" — a name focus-grouped to sound like it protects farmers. Read the text and it does one thing: wipes out state animal welfare laws across the country in a single vote. Laws you passed. Laws courts upheld.

The people it burns first aren't activists — they're independent farmers. Thousands of them spent their own money upgrading barns and raising standards, betting that the law and the market were moving the same direction. This bill turns that bet into a write-off overnight.

The people it pays? Smithfield Foods — America's largest pork producer, owned by China's WH Group — and the handful of meat giants whose lobbyists drafted the thing for themselves.

Here's the tell: the industry has never beaten voters on this. Not in California. Not in Massachusetts. Not in Arizona. Every time cage confinement is on a ballot, it loses. Congress is the last room in America where their money outvotes your ballot — and that's exactly why they're there.

Sign above and drop your email. This fight is moving through Congress right now — we'll keep you posted on where it stands and what happens next →