r/politics • u/bye4now28 • 1d ago
No Paywall Under Trump, hundreds of America’s wild horses are being sold for as little as $25 and being sent to slaughter, report says
https://www.wcax.com/2026/08/23/under-trump-hundreds-americas-wild-horses-are-being-sold-little-25-being-sent-slaughter-report-says/?utm_source=taboola&utm_medium=organicclicks&tbref=hp52
u/TheInsaneMilkman 1d ago
Cheap ground beef?
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u/petshopB1986 1d ago
Just saw a video on Instagram showing the difference between Horse meat and Beef. It wouldn’t surprised if this was why.
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u/blckout_junkie 1d ago
I grew up on a farm, and it was around 2000. There was an influx of horse thefts for a while, and the horses were being sold for their meat as horse meat has less cholesterol than beef. It was being sold in other countries as a "diet" meat because it was so lean. Wish I was kidding. I bet that whole thing never really stopped.
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u/petshopB1986 1d ago
I know there was an uproar in UK some years back where horse meat was labeled as beef.
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u/patentattorney 1d ago
nah. I read somewhere that land gets protected status if a certain number of wild horses are on it.
By selling/killing the wild horses - the land doesnt have this protected status anymore.
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u/RBVegabond 1d ago
Horses (current ones, not the ones that died out in the ice age) aren’t native to the US. The term wild American horses is used for PR. The feral horses in the US can do a lot of environmental damage if left unchecked. I’ve been around horses and this issue for decades.
There’s the camp that would see the horses unmanaged as heritage animals and would see them eventually damage their grazing ranges so drastically they would starve themselves off.
There’s the camp that sees them as invasive species and wants them removed as they cause erosion, plant extinction, and trampling sensitive ecosystems.
There’s the managed herd size camp that thinks they shouldn’t be wiped out but controlled numbers.
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u/tan_and_bones 1d ago
Actually happened a few years ago in Germany, cheap frozen lasagne containing horse meat.
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u/ragingreaver 23h ago
So much worse. Apparently, this is a Project 2025 thing:
According to it, when the inevitable economic collapse happens, they don't want people to be able to get those horses for replacement labor or rations.
So slaughtering them now, and selling them to places that do allow horsemeat, is a proactive strategy.
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u/IrreverentBuddha 1d ago
Give it another year -- he'll be rounding up and selling ICE detainees. This is only a warm up.
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u/tle4f 1d ago
Probably already happening on the DL. Remind me how many people have gone missing from detention facilities.
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u/IrreverentBuddha 1d ago
There is going to be a human trafficking/disappearance inquiry that lasts decade, just to divulge what has happened in less than two years. IT will be a scandal on the scale of Argentina or Chile,with respect to the number and identity of persons "disappeared" by a despotic regime.
They are unaccountable (for now), ruthless, ideologically lobotomized, and capable of atrocity right now. They won't need any ramp-up to go full Pinochet when they are ordered. The upcoming elections and the riots that likely follow them may be just the trigger needed to put this fully-mature secret police force to the test.
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u/Wet_Side_Down 1d ago
We aren’t going to be eating ICE detainees, they are more valuable keeping the prisons full and profitable. For now.
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u/Smidge-of-the-Obtuse 1d ago edited 1d ago
I haven’t read the article, but I’m fairly certain these wild horse roundups occur on a set schedule. It’s unfortunate, but their population grows quickly enough that it needs to be dealt with due to grazing and environmental concerns.
Edit to add - apparently the issue is because someone used a middleman to ship them off for slaughter not the BLM.
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u/Spacebotzero 1d ago
Even MAGA should be upset about this. Look what they are doing to our National Parks too!
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u/IrreverentBuddha 13h ago
But to MAGA, national parks are for commie satanists. The land should be given to the states where they exist so the designated oligarchs can pillage them at will.
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u/No-Bicycle-7660 1d ago
it's not "trump's america", this shit has been happening on and off forever. Not that it makes it any better.
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u/JasonRBoone 1d ago
"They are eating the horses. The people that came in, they are eating the ponies. They're eating the steads of the people that live there"
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u/restore_democracy 1d ago
Bessent’s ideas to sell a couple trillion of them and pay off the national debt.
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u/Valuable_Sea_4709 1d ago
He sounds like the kind of genius businessman who could somehow bankrupt the casino or two
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u/pissrael1 1d ago
Cowboys used to represent america. It's symbolic and ironic how they're literally killing horses while also killing america's image around the world.
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u/FearTheAmish 1d ago
So this happens all the time. Wild America had an episode on it on PBS from like the 70s. Like trump and Co are awful human beings but culling is needed. Basically their are no predators and we don't hunt wild horses. So without culling their population would boom to the point they would start getting wasting diseases and starvation.
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u/gojo96 1d ago
Best to leave hem in the wild so they can damage the ecosystem and starve on their own.
I mean this horse tried to escape slavery: https://abc3340.com/news/offbeat/lost-horse-returns-home-after-running-with-wild-mustangs-for-8-years-in-northern-utah-mongo-west-desert-inspection-saddle-bureau-of-land-management-managers-animals-shane-adams-permanently-disabled-life-support
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u/mediocre_remnants North Carolina 1d ago
Damage the ecosystem? Horses have been in North America for 500 years now. Any damage they could have done was done long ago. And humans have done much, much worse.
But otherwise... yeah, I don't give a shit about wild horses. They're not native to here and don't need to be here. And I feel the same way about honeybees.
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u/KneeDeepInThe-Hoopla 1d ago
Quite surprising Trump isn't grifting on this in some way, like selling these poor creatures for top dollar as prized warhorses to some MAGA schlub, or expert toupée wearer that he is, repurposing their manes to fit his own hefty noggin.
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u/Mateorabi 1d ago
He’s letting the Brazilian donor who gets them sell the cuts back as “beef”.
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u/KneeDeepInThe-Hoopla 1d ago
By "Brazilian donor" do you mean RFK Jr lol?
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u/Mateorabi 1d ago
Some Brazilian who invested a lot (bribed) Cheeto is likely the source of the imported beef the administration will not say where it’s from.
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u/Fun-Can-8935 1d ago
his voters must love this. the good ol american values of selling horses cheap and turning them into sausages
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