This article was originally published at nevadacurrent.com
Wild horses in the Northern Nevada Virginia Range. (Photo courtesy of the American Wild Horse Campaign)
President Donald Trump’s effort to eliminate longstanding protections preventing the slaughter of America’s wild horses hit a snag this week when the U.S. House Committee on Appropriations included language in an Interior Dept. funding bill that reaffirmed the protections.
Trump’s budget proposal to slash funding for the Bureau of Land Management’s Wild Horse and Burro program by 25% would have allowed the slaughter of some 64,000 federal protected wild horses in government holding facilities.
“The action by the House Appropriations Committee, in response to our June 11, 2025, letter, to again prohibit the slaughter of wild horses corrects an omission in the President’s Budget Request,” U.S. Rep. Dina Titus, a Democrat from Nevada, said in a statement to the Current.
Trump’s proposal “would have also allowed for the large-scale transfer of wild horses and burros to foreign countries such as Canada and Mexico, where horse slaughter facilities continue to operate,” the American Wild Horse Conservation (AWHC) said in a news release.
The effort mirrored Trump’s 2017 budget, which initially called for a 30% cut to the program’s funding and the elimination of protections against slaughter. Congress restored the protections against killing the animals and augmented funding.
The House bill appropriates $144 million to the BLM’s Wild Horse and Burro Program.
The measure “reaffirms Congressional intent to prohibit slaughter and reflects the values of the American people,” Suzanne Roy, executive director of AWHC, said in a news release.
Legislation introduced by Titus last week calls for the BLM to employ humane roundup techniques.
“Wild horses need to be protected from slaughter but also from helicopter roundups that can injure and kill them,” Titus said. “What is needed now is action by Congress on my legislation to eliminate the use of helicopters in BLM wild horse roundups and require a report to explore the benefits of alternative methods for humanely gathering horses, such as employing traditional cowboys.”
In the last five years, the government has spent at least $36.7 million on roundups, according to Titus, including more than $6 million paid in one year to helicopter roundup contractors.
“Scientific research has shown that more humane and cost-effective alternatives, like fertility control, are equally effective in controlling equine populations,” Titus said in a news release. “The BLM’s Wild Horse and Burro Program, however, currently spends less than four percent of its budget on these methods.”
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