Staff
While the agriculture community celebrated its victory today with passage of House Bill 1999, clearing the way for the slaughter of horses in the state, the champion of the bill continued to fend off angry animal rights activists from out of state and things got uglier than expected.
State House media officials on Tuesday afternoon advised Rep. Skye McNiel to decline public interviews due to letters of a threatening nature which a spokesman says have been turned over to law enforcement authorities.
A McNiel spokesman was referring press calls to the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.
The measure passed with ease in the Senate and Governor Fallin is expected to sign the bill. A spokesman said her office has been inundated with thousands of calls but 84 percent opposing slaughter came from out of state.
The measure took center stage after three out of state groups known as the “horse warriors” descended upon Oklahoma to stage public protests about a month ago and have relentlessly called, staged demonstrations and have taken over public blogs and Facebook sites.
TMR experienced the Internet frenzy after we reported on Saturday morning that Governor Fallin would likely sign the bill. TMR set a new record for traffic on a Saturday.
Just peace loving animal rights wackos who threaten an elected politician. Why heavens sake tell me it ain’t so.
It looks like they won to keep her quiet. But I still would like to know hy she still didn’t keep talking? It does say a lot about character.
There was a press conference down town on March 4th that coincided with a BLM meeting regarding wild horses.
I was at the Press Conference as were many many Oklahomans that are against horse slaughter. It is Oklahomans that are 80+ percent against horse slaughter not out of state people. We aren’t animal rights whackos but instead concerned about tainted meat being sold to foreign countries. We don’t raise our horses for the food supply. We treat them with many banned substances. In fact the largest purchaser of horse meat from Mexico and Canada the EU has stated they will no longer accept horse meat from USA horses. With all the horse meat sold as beef in 14 countries, it will quite possibly end up here. We are concerned about our beef industry. What will happen to it if horse meat is found in the USA food supply? Although Rep. McNiel’s bill says the horse meat will be sold to foreign countries, who will regulate that to make sure it doesn’t end up in our food supply? Our horses have been shipped to Mexico and Canada and are slaughtered for food. The kill buyers falsify the paper work. They have done it for years so it seems they know the horses medical history’s. They have no idea as they buy them through sale barns, or pick them up from Craigs List. They don’t care. I would think that we as a country would be concerned about selling meat that is not safe for human consumption to anyone. It’s not safe for animals either.
I’m sorry if Rep. McNiel feels that she is in danger. I certainly hold nothing against her. She is just doing what so many of our state politicians do and trying to increase the revenue of her family owned business. I doubt that horse slaughter will take place here or anywhere in the USA unless there is some sort of passport system put into place to track every horse. I don’t think horse owners will like having to have the vet out to worm their horses every 8 weeks so that that would be noted on the individual horses passport.. All medical treatments would have to be done by a vet and noted on the passport. Farm calls aren’t cheap.
[…] The McCarville Report has previously noted that State House media officials have advised Rep. Skye McNiel to decline public interviews due to letters of a threatening nature which a spokesman says have been turned over to law enforcement authorities. Click here for that story on the McCarville Report. […]