In a welcome move, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has announced it will reevaluate its approval of cyanide bombs called M-44s – devices that state and federal agencies scatter around public and private lands to kill coyotes who are seen as posing a threat to livestock. These deadly devices...

Despite ecological devastation, habitat loss, human-wildlife conflict, poaching and all the other threats that undermine the ability of wild animals to survive in their natural habitats, Europe’s largest hunting fair opened this week in Dortmund, Germany . Considering the imminent danger these...

The federal government has handed out a record number of waivers this month for chicken slaughterhouses to dial up the already dangerous speeds at which they kill birds. The development not only raises animal welfare concerns, but it comes at a time when slaughterhouses have emerged as major...

The Lion King is breaking box office records worldwide, with $1.335 billion in cumulative global box office receipts, including $472.8 million in the United States, as of last weekend. More importantly, it’s delighting audiences everywhere, which is hardly surprising, given the deep appeal that...

The images of the orca Tahlequah keeping her dead calf afloat in Puget Sound while trying to keep pace with the other members of her pod have moved millions worldwide. The calf died on July 24 just half an hour after being born, raising not just global sympathy for Tahlequah’s grief but deeper...

The U.S. Congress has been the scene of many a power grab over the years, but few have been as brazen as the current bid to tack onto the upcoming farm bill a vague and overreaching measure known as the EATS Act (S. 2019 in the Senate, with companion House legislation expected to be reintroduced...

I recently wrote about how all people, no matter their circumstances, have an inherent connection with animals. The composition of the animal protection movement, however, has not always reflected everyone’s voice. Recently our staff had the pleasure of hearing historian Paula Tarankow, who holds a...

Today, we released the grisly findings of three undercover investigations into wildlife killing contests in Virginia, including the largest contest held east of the Mississippi River. The heartbreaking callousness and carnage our investigators saw at the weigh-ins of the three contests, which took...

Facebook’s recent takedown of dozens of troll accounts linked to a single marketing firm sheds new light on the intensely deceptive tactics used by trophy hunting groups to sell the public and politicians a bill of goods. Last week, the social media network announced it was permanently banning Rally...

As a result of slaughterhouse closures during the pandemic, some producers have used a cruel method called “ventilation shutdown,” or VSD, to kill whole herds of pigs. Ventilator shutdown involves locking a flock or herd of animals in a building and turning off the ventilation systems. As the...

Today, in a crucial victory for animals, President Trump signed into law the Farm Bill minus the anti-animal King amendment but with three pro-animal measures. This is an outcome the Humane Society Legislative Fund had long worked for, along with our Humane Society of the United States legal and...

With the confirmed deaths of 3.4 million chickens and 5,500 hogs in North Carolina’s factory farms during Hurricane Florence, and the toxic torrent released by the flooded-out fecal lagoons of the industry in that state, a look at federal policy on factory farming could not be more timely. Through...

At the Super Bowl this year, we caught a glimpse of the future of food from an unlikely source: Carl’s Jr. During the big game, the fast food chain advertised its new Beyond Burger — a patty that tastes just like meat, but is entirely plant-based. For a major fast food chain to announce a plant...

A U.S. District Court has ordered Jeff Lowe, a notorious big cat exhibitor who took over the running of Joe Exotic’s zoo, GW Exotics, to ​surrender all big cat cubs and their mothers in his possession over allegations of mistreatment. The preliminary injunction in the Department of Justice case for...

By Kitty Block and Sara Amundson In the past two years, our federal government has waged war against the Endangered Species Act, the bedrock law that protects endangered and threatened animal species and their habitats. Today, despite our hopes that it would take the steps necessary to enforce our...

Wolves across most of the continental United States must have Endangered Species Act protections restored, a federal judge ruled yesterday, effectively prohibiting trophy hunting of the species across most of the country. This tremendous victory is the result of a lawsuit filed by the Humane Society...

You’re used to reading here and elsewhere about larger cruelty deployments in which The HSUS is involved, and that’s an important role we play as an organization with highly trained responders and a full-fledged animal response team. A large-scale animal cruelty case can be costly, and it is...

The Humane Society of the United States steps in swiftly when called upon to help animals in the aftermath of major disasters, natural and man-made. But even in a situation in which we’re working to help transport and rescue hundreds of animals, we never lose sight of the individual, as a recent...

The other day, the Washington Post’s Pam Constable published a story about a wealthy American hunter who paid $110,000 for the right to kill a rare and magnificent mountain goat in Pakistan. There are just several thousand markhors alive, so it’s hard to see how killing one does the species much...

Last month, so many Floridians were shocked when the decaying body of a yearling bear cub, fondly nicknamed Bailey by members of the sprawling community that he sometimes visited, was discovered. This was an unlawful killing on its face, one that violated Florida regulations, but what was even more...