PETA President Hits Las Vegas on September 8

For Immediate Release:
August 14, 2013

Contact:
Moira Colley 202-483-7382

Las Vegas — PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk is headed to Las Vegas for a private event on September 8, and I thought you might be interested in sitting down with her while she’s in town for a discussion on how she has led PETA to so many landmark victories for animals over the past three decades.

Newkirk could talk about the early victories that put PETA on the map—such as the first-ever convictions for cruelty to animals in laboratories and on factory farms—as well as major breakthroughs that PETA has made in just the last few months to stop animal abuse, including the following:

• After a PETA campaign, Madigan Army Medical Center in Tacoma, Wash., has agreed to replace the use of ferrets in invasive intubation exercises with lifelike human simulators.
• Eleven bears who had languished in barren concrete pits at Chief Saunooke Bear Park in North Carolina were finally freed following a PETA undercover investigation that forced the roadside zoo to surrender its exhibitor’s license. The animals have been transferred to an animal sanctuary in Dallas, where they roam, dig, swim, and climb trees—in other words, where they can finally be bears.
• A two-month undercover investigation by PETA revealed thousands of neglected, dying animals at Global Captive Breeders—the largest U.S. company that bred and sold reptiles and rats for the “pet” trade—and led to the largest rescue of neglected rats in U.S. history and the largest seizure of animals ever in California. The company’s owner and former manager have been charged with 106 counts of felony cruelty to animals.
• Each of the top 10 advertising agencies in the U.S. has signed PETA’s pledge never to use great apes—such as baby chimpanzees, who are torn away from their mothers shortly after birth and beaten into obedience—in their advertisements.

Other current topics that Newkirk could discuss include the world’s first in vitro hamburger; Blackfish, the movie that’s keeping kids and their parents away from SeaWorld; “ag-gag” bills designed to stop the videotaping of abuses on factory farms; and designers and actors—including Stella McCartney, Ann Taylor, Ryan Gosling, Penélope Cruz, and Kate Winslet—who are helping PETA change animals’ lives.