In a victory for transparency in the food system, FarmSTAND (formerly the Food Project at Public Justice) successfully challenged a Utah statute that criminalized whistleblowing in the animal agricultural industry—in particular, slaughterhouses, meat processing plants, and factory farms. The law at issue—enacted by the state of Utah in 2012—made it a crime to “interfere” with any agricultural operation or facility by virtue of taking photographs or recordings of the operation without the owner’s consent. That prohibition—colloquially known as an “Ag-gag” statute—criminalizes what has been, since the turn of the twentieth century, the key vehicle for exposing inhumane, unsafe, and illegal conditions in the industrial agriculture system.
Ag-gag laws such as Utah’s pose a serious threat to public health and safety. Over the last few years, a number of major federal recalls of meat, poultry, and dairy products were prompted by undercover investigations launched by whistleblowers from the public interest community. These recalls helped stem the outbreak of diseases that have killed and injured thousands of unsuspecting consumers. Laws like Utah’s are expressly designed to block such investigations in order to prevent the public – and federal and state government’s – from knowing about unsafe conditions inside animal factories.
To learn more about FarmSTAND’s work on ag-gag laws in other states, see our page on Ag-Gag Litigation.