Block efforts to hurt responsible farmers

My wife and I raise pork, beef, poultry and eggs with a simple philosophy: animals deserve to live as close to nature as possible. Our livestock are pasture-raised, free to roam and treated with respect. That commitment to humane care isn’t just good ethics, it’s what produces high-quality food our community can trust.

But state laws that promote humane standards, like California’s Proposition 12, which voters overwhelmingly approved in 2018, are under attack. Prop 12 requires pork sold in California to come from farms that give animals basic space to move, banning extreme confinement practices. It’s a commonsense standard that reflects both consumer demand for more humanely raised food products and the values of voters across the political spectrum.

Unfortunately, Congress is considering the Food Security and Farm Protection Act, nothing more than the failed Ending Agriculture Trade Suppression Act under a new name. Its purpose is the same: to strip states of the right to set their own agricultural standards, erase hard-earned progress and tilt the playing field toward industrial producers who don’t have important animal welfare standards.

As if that weren’t enough, the Save Our Bacon Act was introduced this summer. It’s another attempt to undercut responsible farmers who’ve already invested in higher standards while rewarding operations that rely on confining animals to cages so small they can barely move. Both bills would punish farmers who did the right thing and ignore the voices of voters who demanded more humane farming practices.

Farmers like us know that the way we raise animals matters, for the animals, for consumers and for the integrity of agriculture itself. Senators Durbin and Duckworth, Rep. LaHood, along with all of Congress should reject attempts to destroy Prop 12 and other state laws and instead support the progress that farmers and voters have already chosen.

Joe Wanda

Harvard