DOJ Launches Attack on Landmark Animal Protection Law

This unprecedented move comes just as Congressional leaders announced plans to rush through a new Farm Bill that could destroy similar protections across the country. We’re witnessing an attack that could erase decades of progress for animals.

A two-front war on animal protection

The DOJ’s lawsuit claims that Proposition 12—a law that ensures farmed animals have enough space to turn around and extend their limbs—is driving up egg prices and is superseded by federal regulations. But let’s be clear: this isn’t about egg prices. It’s about powerful interests working to protect the status quo—even when it means rolling back hard-won gains for animals.

This is the same law that voters passed overwhelmingly and that the Supreme Court already upheld. Overturning this law would override the will of the people—and strip states of their power to reject products of extreme animal cruelty.

House Agriculture Committee Chairman GT Thompson recently announced plans to pass a “Farm Bill 2.0” by September—one that includes provisions specifically designed to destroy Proposition 12 and similar protections nationwide. If both these efforts succeed, we won’t just lose Proposition 12. States across America could lose their ability to ban products that are the result of the worst factory farming practices.

What’s really at stake

This coordinated assault threatens to eliminate:

• Laws that let states and local communities keep products of cruelty—like eggs from caged hens or pork from pigs confined in gestation crates—off their shelves. States could still ban cruel practices within their own borders, but they’d lose the power to prevent the sale of products from animals raised in extreme confinement elsewhere.
• Future efforts to protect animals at the state level.
• The basic right of states to reject products of cruelty.

But there’s hope. When Prop 12 was on the line at the Supreme Court, supporters across the country made it clear that animal protection matters. That unified voice helped show just how deeply people care about the right to reject cruelty. When they proposed the original anti-animal EATS Act in 2023, your voices helped stop the bill in its tracks.

Your voice matters more than ever

The next two months will determine whether we preserve vital protections for animals—or watch them disappear. The factory farming industry is betting that if they just keep attacking, eventually we’ll get tired and give up.

They’re wrong.

Contact your Representatives and Senators today. Tell them you oppose any version of the Farm Bill that would undermine state animal protection laws. Together, we can ensure that states retain their right to reject products of cruelty—and keep moving forward toward a world where all animals are treated as the living, feeling beings they are.