KPG joins News Radio 1000 KTOK to talk EATS Act

The Ending Agricultural Trade Suppression (EATS) Act would strip state and local governments of their ability to regulate agriculture within their borders.

September 22, 2023

Kirkpatrick Policy Group’s Louisa McCune and Brendan Hoover, and Wayne Pacelle of Animal Wellness Action, joined Gwin Faulconer-Lippert on News Radio 1000 KTOK on September 17, 2023, to voice our opposition to the EATS Act. Give it a listen!

https://on.soundcloud.com/fdLfD

Introduced in June 2023, at the behest of the foreign-and corporate-controlled pork industry, the “Ending Agricultural Trade Suppression (EATS) Act,” would create new federal law usurping the will of millions of voters, thwart building market forces in the nation’s agriculture industry, fly in the face of states’ rights ideology, and condone the controversial and tortuous practice of extreme confinement in animal agriculture.

The EATS Act would prevent states and local jurisdictions from “interfering with the production and distribution of agricultural products in interstate commerce.” The proposed legislation is a coordinated response by the National Pork Producers Council to laws passed in California and Massachusetts – recently affirmed by the United States Supreme Court – banning the sale of pork, veal, and egg products within state borders produced using extreme confinement cage systems. Fifteen states have passed laws banning or phasing out extreme confinement, including the most recent, New Jersey. The EATS Act panders to the pork lobby’s special interests; Congress defeated similar amendments on two previous Farm Bills. If passed, the EATS Act could make the United States one of the worst offending countries for farmers, animals, and the environment, with incalculable consequences.