Iowa Select Farms

Iowa

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Email Wright County Attorney Eric Simonson today to politely ask him to prosecute animal cruelty at Iowa Select Farms.

DxE exposed Iowa's largest “pork” producer using a gruesome mass kill method called “ventilation shutdown” (VSD).

Thousands of pigs were loaded into a shed, the vents were sealed off, and heat and steam were pumped inside to kill them. With the help of an employee whistleblower who was sickened by the cruelty, DxE investigators captured hidden-camera video of the pigs screaming in agony for hours as they died. They also rescued a piglet and named her Gilly.

Brutality like this is the result of a corrupt food system.

The USDA handed out millions of dollars to make up for the profit companies lost from killing off their animals during the pandemic. A producer like Iowa Select Farms could get hundreds of dollars for every pig they killed and threw away.

Instead of prosecuting the horrific animal cruelty at Iowa Select Farms, the state of Iowa came after the whistleblowers who exposed it. In direct response to DxE’s investigations, Governor Kim Reynolds has signed a series of “ag-gag” bills into law to protect the industry from public scrutiny. Matt Johnson was the first person to be charged under Iowa's third "ag-gag" law, which was enacted less than two weeks after the release of DxE’s exposé. In January 2022, the day before Matt was set to start trial, all charges against him were dropped. This is a victory, but it is not the end. We are calling on Iowa county attorneys to prosecute Iowa Select Farms for animal cruelty and asking Governor Reynolds to end "ag-gag" laws that criminalize whistleblowing.

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