Liberty Broadband to Face Push to End Iditarod Sponsorship at Annual Meeting

For Immediate Release:
June 13, 2022

Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382

When will Liberty Broadband stop sullying its reputation and drop GCI’s sponsorship of the Iditarod race, in which more than 150 dogs have died? That’s the message PETA will deliver at the company’s annual meeting on Tuesday, in a push for its subsidiary GCI—an Alaskan internet service provider—to stop sponsoring a race that penalizes mushers who try to prevent dogs from dying in perilous storms. PETA recently purchased stock in Liberty Broadband.

At the virtual meeting, PETA will outline to stockholders and the board that the Iditarod forces dogs to run 1,000 miles in subzero temperatures and that hundreds of dogs are pulled off the trail every year due to exhaustion, illness, and injury—yet GCI still funds the race to the tune of $250,000 annually. This year, Millennium Hotels and Resorts and Nutanix joined ExxonMobil, Jack Daniel’s, Coca-Cola, Wells Fargo, Alaska Airlines, and 14 other companies that have cut ties with the Iditarod after hearing from PETA and seeing video footage and photographs of grossly inhumane conditions during and between races.

“No reputable company should associate itself with a race that runs dogs until their bodies give out or they die from inhaling their own vomit,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “PETA is calling on Liberty Broadband to stand up for dogs by stopping GCI from bankrolling the Iditarod’s cruelty.”

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.

PETA’s shareholder question follows.

My name is Melanie Johnson, and I have a question on behalf of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA.

Despite more than 150 documented dog deaths and nearly every major company pulling their support, Liberty Broadband subsidiary GCI continues to sponsor Alaska’s deadly Iditarod dog-sled race to the tune of $250,000 every year.

Dogs in the Iditarod are forced to run 1,000 miles through blinding snowstorms and subzero temperatures in some of the most grueling conditions on Earth. During this year’s race alone, nearly 250 dogs were pulled off the trail because they were too exhausted, ill, or injured to go on, and outrage ensued when officials fined mushers for taking dogs indoors during a potentially deadly storm. When not forced to race, these dogs spend their lives chained to dilapidated boxes or plastic barrels in all weather extremes, often denied veterinary care for painful injuries.

Just this year, Millennium Hotels and Resorts and Nutanix joined Alaska Airlines, Coca-Cola, ExxonMobil, Jack Daniel’s, Wells Fargo, and 14 other companies that have cut ties with the Iditarod. My question is this: When will Liberty Broadband stop funding this hideous cycle of torment and death by dropping GCI’s sponsorship of the Iditarod?