‘NIH Doesn’t Give a Rat’s A**!’ PETA Urges Trump to End Wasteful Animal Tests in Mar-a-Lago Appeal
For Immediate Release:
December 20, 2024
Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382
If President-elect Donald Trump looks out his windows at Mar-a-Lago today, he’ll see a mobile message from PETA urging him to end the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) annual waste of billions of tax dollars on cruel and archaic experiments on animals.
PETA’s mobile billboard reads: “President Trump: NIH Doesn’t Give a Rat’s A** About Waste. Cut $23 Billion!” and will be driven on S. Ocean Blvd., bordering Mar-a-Lago, from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Friday, December 20.
“Ending the waste at NIH starts with slamming the brakes on the runaway gravy train that funnels billions of taxpayer dollars each year into cruel, worthless experiments on animals,” says PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo. “PETA urges President-elect Trump to redirect taxpayer funds to modern research that will both spare animals and speed up treatments and cures for humans.”
NIH squanders nearly half its annual budget on projects involving animal experiments, even though 90% of basic research, most of which involves animals, fails to lead to effective treatments for humans, and 95% of new drugs that test safe and effective in animals fail in human trials. PETA scientists’ Research Modernization Deal provides evidence of the failure of studies on animals and lays out a strategy for transitioning to more cutting-edge science.
Pointless studies funded by NIH include forcing monkeys to stare at photos of candidates to see if they can predict winners, ripping infant monkeys from their mothers and forcing them to wear strobe-effect goggles for 12 hours a day, and relentlessly shocking the feet of mice, supposedly to cause panic attacks.
PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—points out thatEvery Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.
