It turns out that Dick has very recent violations of injuring the feet of horses – a practice known as horse “soring” — but USDA still allowed him to compete. Dick will serve a federal suspension for violating the HPA beginning October 1st — with the punishment conveniently taking effect after he got to show his horse at the industry’s main event. The consent decision that Dick agreed to with USDA was signed on December 20, 2018, and it’s a travesty that the suspension was delayed for nearly nine months to allow him to appear at The Celebration so that he was able to participate in the high-profile showring event.
Poor enforcement and delayed sentencing seem to be the new normal at USDA. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue and his own Office of Administrative Law Judges have agreed to dozens of consent decisions with serial violators of the Horse Protection Act. Some of the key players in the industry have been cited but their suspensions don’t take effect until 2022! Justice delayed, as the old saying goes, is justice denied.
Post World Grand Championship Interview with a very smug Rodney Dick
The Trump Administration signaled its tolerance for soring right from the start of the Administration in January 2017. The Trump Administration tapped Brian Klippenstein, the former head of Protect the Harvest – a political group focused exclusively on thwarting animal welfare reforms and headed by oil tycoon Forrest Lucas – to head the transition team at USDA.
In 2017, the first directive the Trump Administration enacted under Klippenstein’s regime was to nix a rule to ban the use of stacks and chains on horses’ feet in horse shows and to eliminate the industry’s corrupt self-regulation program. That rule was the cusp of enactment before the USDA snatched it away.
On the eve of the Trump Inauguration, myself, Priscilla Presley, Wayne Pacelle, former Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-KY), and Rep. Steve Cohen were all working to ensure that the aforementioned regulation would take effect. But the USDA, which drafted the anti-soring rule, did a 180 degree turn as soon as Klippenstein assumed his post.
Soring was openly practiced at the 2019 Celebration. The USDA sent a signal that it would do little to stop the abuse of horses when the agency’s own General Counsel, Stephen Alexander Vaden presented awards to “Big Lick” champions at the 2019 Celebration, according to the Shelbyville Times-Gazette. More than anyone at USDA, the Agency’s top lawyer should be alert to the appearance of a conflict of interest, but he decided to abandon his role as referee and join the side that has demonstrated scofflaw behavior year after year. If that’s not evidence the USDA is colluding with the pro-soring crowd, then I don’t what is.
Informants on the grounds of the horse show reported that numerous horses’ stacked shoes were also found with sheets of heavy lead inside them — a new technique that trainers are utilizing to add weight, exacerbating the pain caused by soring.
In 2019, soring abusers are brazenly flouting the law and counting on the USDA personnel to twiddle their thumbs as trainers torture horses. The Walking Horse Trainers Association awarded their “Trainer of the Year” award at the Celebration to Phillip Trimble, another serial violator of the HPA who’s set to serve a two-year USDA suspension beginning in 2020.
Our short-term hope is to call on the U.S. Senate to pass the Prevent All Soring Tactics (PAST) Act, S. 1007. The House passed the companion bill to that measure in July by a vote of 333 to 96. The bill would ban the use of large stacked shoes and ankle chains in the showring, eliminate the industry’s failed self-policing program, and increase penalties for abusers. Please ask your Senators to cosponsor the bill, and #PassthePASTAct by clicking here to send a message, and then call them at 202-224-3121 and follow-up by phone – you can and will make the difference.