May the new year bring peace, hope, and abundance to our wild ones.
May we find the intelligence and fortitude to bring about the reforms needed.
May we all find a place to call home, where we can amplify our voices and hold each other with compassion on this long journey.
In 2024 we broke barriers and expanded our work. From documenting roundups during a record breaking year, to winning court cases to crack the fight open to keep our wild ones free.
In just hours 2025 begins. We will face threats new and old. We will face a promised acceleration of the exploitation of public lands resources by profit driven interests that will increase the pressure on our wild ones. Large scale removals, zeroing out of herds and the loss of habitat needed for any wild thing to survive.
We will need to work hard to hold onto the wins of 2024 and push them forward to keep our wild ones free.
There is also a real threat to our wild ones in holding facilities as they are now labelled a “tax-payer burden” after being removed to accommodate tax-payer subsidized industries like livestock, hard rock mining and energy. We expect funding to feed wild horses and burros in holding to be on the chopping block and a renewed call to sell off the captives without limits (slaughter) or to kill them outright (as we saw in 2017).
We will need to work hard to stop the current loopholes that continue to land our wild ones in the slaughter pipeline and to beat back new threats.
Remember, united in our love for our wild ones, we are a force to be reckoned with.
Onward.
