Through determination, innovation, and creativity, our society is solving some of the biggest challenges facing animals. Non-animal tests for cosmetics, chemicals, and household products are faster, cheaper, safer, and more reliable than laboratory experiments on animals. Computer-generated imagery is making exciting movies and TV commercials without the suffering and abuse of captive exotic wildlife. Eco-tourism appeals to millions of visitors and is a bigger boost to the economy in African nations than trophy hunting.

Rhode Island last week banned the trade in shark fins, joining ten other states and three Pacific territories in sending a message that this cruel product is not welcome within their borders. These state policy actions are helping to dry up the demand for shark finning—the barbaric practice of hacking the fins off sharks, often while they’re still alive, and throwing the mutilated animals back overboard to languish and die.

Through determination, innovation, and creativity, our society is solving some of the biggest challenges facing animals. Non-animal tests for cosmetics, chemicals, and household products are faster, cheaper, safer, and more reliable than laboratory experiments on animals. Computer-generated imagery is making exciting movies and TV commercials without the suffering and abuse of captive exotic wildlife. Eco-tourism appeals to millions of visitors and is a bigger boost to the economy in African nations than trophy hunting.

The House of Representatives today debated H.R. 2576, the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, a compromise bill produced after months of negotiation between key parties in the House and Senate to modernize and reform the 40-year-old Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). The House will vote on the bill tonight and the Senate is expected to take it up as soon as tomorrow. 

After almost 20 years of inaction, the U.S. Department of Agriculture finally proposed in February an update of its standards of care for marine mammals in captivity. But the proposed standards are weak, and need to be strengthened substantially.

We had a powerful showing today in the U.S. House Appropriations Committee, with animal protection leaders Reps. Sam Farr, D-Calif., and Charlie Dent, R-Pa., securing enough votes to pass their amendment dealing with horse slaughter for human consumption. The "defund" amendment to prevent the opening of horse slaughter plants on U.S. soil passed by a vote of 25 to 23.

Last night the Humane Society Legislative Fund and The Humane Society of the United States hosted our annual congressional Humane Awards, where we honored a bipartisan group of lawmakers who led the way for animals during the last year. More than 50 Senators and Representatives plus staff members from dozens of additional offices attended the event in the U.S. Capitol, as we celebrated the federal lawmakers who are leading the way to make the world a better place for animals.

Against a backdrop of election year politics and partisan fights in Congress, lawmakers are moving forward to fund the federal government and all its programs. The House and Senate Appropriations Committees have been holding hearings and are preparing to mark up the individual bills designating funds for agencies including the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Department of the Interior, Environmental Protection Agency, National Institutes of Health, and others whose budgets have a direct impact on animals. 

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., today introduced the Big Cat Public Safety Act, S. 2541, which would restrict the private ownership and breeding of big cats in the United States. Enactment of this legislation cannot come soon enough, to address the national crisis of big cats in captivity and stem the tide of problems created by reckless individuals owning and breeding tigers, lions, and other big cats and putting the rest of society at risk.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie last week vetoed a bipartisan bill that would have put a roadblock in place in New Jersey for the next Walter Palmer-wannabee who wanted to slay a lion and bring his head back to the states. New Jersey lawmakers had overwhelmingly passed legislation to block the shipment of big-game trophies of lions, tigers, leopards, Cape buffalo, elephants, rhinoceros, and other endangered animals through New Jersey ports.