Statement from American Wild Horse Conservation Regarding New World Screwworm

The recent closure of portions of the U.S.-Mexico border due to the threat of New World screwworm has had an unintended but welcome consequence: it has temporarily disrupted the flow of American horses destined for slaughter in Mexico.

While the circumstances driving these restrictions are serious, they also highlight a troubling reality. Tens of thousands of American horses remain vulnerable to a slaughter pipeline that depends on the cross-border transport of equines through livestock trade channels. For America’s wild horses and burros, the stakes are especially high. As federal agencies continue removing thousands of these federally protected animals from public lands, strong safeguards are needed to ensure they never enter slaughter channels.

No horse’s fate should depend on a disease outbreak, a border closure, or shifting market conditions. The only lasting solution is to permanently end horse slaughter and the export of American horses for that purpose.

That is why American Wild Horse Conservation continues to support the bipartisan Save America’s Forgotten Equines (SAFE) Act (H.R. 1661 / S. 775), which would permanently prohibit horse slaughter in the United States and ban the export of American horses for slaughter abroad.

The temporary disruption caused by the screwworm outbreak demonstrates how fragile and unpredictable the slaughter pipeline truly is. Congress should seize this opportunity to enact permanent protections and ensure that America’s wild horses and burros, and all American equines, are forever protected from slaughter.

American Wild Horse Conservation urges our supporters and all Americans who care about horses to contact their U.S. Senators and Representatives and ask them to cosponsor and pass the SAFE Act. Together, we can close the slaughter pipeline once and for all and ensure that no American horse is shipped across our borders to be slaughtered for human consumption.