The fact that a provision that would outlaw commercial mink farms in the United States made it into a larger legislative bill should be concerning to anyone involved in animal agriculture.
Late last week, a pair of press releases from a group called Animal Wellness Action reached my inbox, and those releases announced that the a pair members of the U.S. House of Representatives succeeded in getting an anti-mink farming rider added to the America COMPETES Act, which passed the House on February 4.
In this case COMPETES is an acronym for Creating Opportunities for Manufacturing, Pre-Eminence in Technology and Economic Strength. So, like is the case with most legislative riders, anti-mink farming legislation has little to do with the original bill.
But in the lead paragraph of one of those press releases, it identified one of the two legislators to push for this, and it should come as no surprise: Rep. Rosa DeLauro. The Democrat from Connecticut has a long history of being an adversary to animal agriculture. And in this case, she found an ally in Rep. Nancy Mace, R-South Carolina, to get this rider added.
I know mink farming isn’t as big as it used to be. Many, like DeLauro, consider it cruel. Others think wearing fur is pretentious and anachronistic. But the reality is the fur industry isn’t what it used to be mostly because of the animal rights lobby. That industry was really the first industry on the radars of such groups.
Now the press releases cite concerns of mink spreading COVID-19, and they even got a medical point of view from Gary Michelson, MD, founder of the Michelson Center for Public Policy, Gary Michelson, M.D. But you scan the Michelson Center’s website, and it lists animal welfare as one of the three main issues it prioritizes.
I’m not going to pretend I have a lot of knowledge about the potential links between mink and the spread of COVID-19, but it appears this is just another way for the animal rights lobby to play at people’s emotions to hit animal agriculture.
Why we should care
It’s easy to forget about the mink industry, especially if you live in a region where there has never been any mink production.
But during a session at the 2018 Animal Agriculture Alliance Stakeholders Summit, I heard Jason Roesler, director of public affairs at Fur Commission USA, tell a very memorable story.
He recalled a time in 2003, when he was away from home at college, his family was targeted by animal rights activists on their mink ranch in Washington. More than 11,000 animals were released, causing more than $1 million in damages. About 2,000 animals were lost or deceased and 22 generations worth of records were destroyed.
“We had our peace of mind, privacy and security attacked,” Roesler said.
I couldn’t help but feel for Roesler and figure anyone with any compassion for fellow humans would have felt the same way, regardless of how they feel about mink farming.
The reality is that individuals who are like-minded with the criminals who hit the Roesler farm have already hit poultry farms, and will likely continue to do so.
And now that a bill to completely shut down the mink industry has made its way through the House, that ups the ante. It could someday happen to other animal agriculture industries as well.
