Center for Food Safety Applauds Supreme Court’s Decision in Important Animal Welfare and Public Health Case

Today, in a win for animal rights and public health advocates, the Supreme Court sided with California in upholding the state’s Proposition 12. The state Proposition prohibits the sale of pork in the state which is not produced according to California's animal welfare standards.

The following is a statement from Center for Food Safety Legal Director George Kimbrell on the Supreme Court decision in Nat’l Pork Producers Council v. Ross. CFS filed a brief in support of California in the case last year.

“Today’s decision is a major victory for animal welfare and a more regenerative, healthful, and humane future of our food. The Supreme Court rejected industrial agriculture’s far-reaching efforts to curtail states’ rights to enact laws governing farming to prevent animal cruelty and to protect the public health. Instead the Court properly recognized the value and benefits of such laws. Intensive confinement of pigs poses profound danger to food safety and the public health such as foodborne illness and disease and pathogen transmission, and important laws like Prop 12 mitigate those risks.”