Lewis Bollard

the first problem is structural.

So at the state level, they've had to use ballot measures to get around entrenched lobbies.

In this case, things start out in the House and Senate ag committees, which are heavily dominated by agricultural interests.

The majority of House members, I think, signed a letter against this in the last Congress, but the vast majority of them are not on the ag committee.

And so the ag committee gets to decide what's in this bill.

And if you're on the ag committee, I mean, the House ag committee just hosted a hearing on this.

They only invited lobbyists

for the industry.

They didn't bother to provide a single opposing witness to their hearing.

We're also seeing that the industry is much better organized and funded on this effort than advocates are.

So the industry is constantly flying out a bunch of big industrial pork farmers claiming they speak for the entire industry, telling the legislators this is their number one priority and absolutely has to be done.

By contrast, animal welfare groups are not getting the same hearing.

So legislators are not taking them as seriously as they take these agro.

There is a large constituency of family farmers who support these laws because it has created a new market opportunity for them where they can sell their already higher welfare meat and not be undercut by the industrial stuff.

The problem they have is that they are far less wealthy and organized than the industrial pork interests.

And so they don't have the money to just fly themselves to D.C.

They can't stop farming.

The people who are actually doing family farming can't just go to D.C.

and hang out for a week because they need to be farming and looking after the pigs on their farm.

I mean, there are people who are funding some of these family farmers to go to Washington, D.C., but we could see a far bigger effort.