Are you confused about the process to fund the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Wild Horse and Burro Program? One of the most common questions we get in our inbox is about the budget bill (Appropriations). When you call your lawmakers in the House and Senate, you are either asking them to sponsor or vote on a specific bill (like the Safeguard America’s Forgotten Equines or, SAFE ACT, to stop all shipment of equines for slaughter), or you are asking them to fund or defund something in the spending bill (like creating a line item to fund the formalization of a concise and enforceable welfare policy).

Congress creates law (passes bills) that include things like The Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971, to passing bills that determine what federal agencies can spend money on (or the “authority” to carry out a funded provision of law). 

Specific details of approved actions in the Wild Horse and Burro Program has to go through an analysis process as defined under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). This is where you send comments directly to agencies and we litigate agencies when they fail in various aspects of law. We do know that NEPA itself is being gutted and changes to what BLM will have to analyze and disclose are underway (gutting reviews and making it easier for BLM to do things and not tell you.)

It might not seem like it, but there is actually a process for the federal budget and Appropriations process that aligns with the federal government fiscal year (October 1st – September 30th). You can see the process in the graphic above. 

If you look at the timeline above, you can see that right now is the time to engage your lawmakers to set budget language for the next budget, fiscal year 2026. What do you want to see change? How do you phrase those requests as “fund or defund?” An example would be to call your lawmaker about the Department of Interior (DOI) BLM budget for the Wild Horse and Burro Program and say: “Maintain prohibitions on killing healthy wild horses or burros and maintain the prohibition on sales without limits (slaughter).”

The process of creating the budget for the federal government begins with the Presidential Budget Request. This budget request details the administration’s position on the full range of federal revenue and spending and administrations can use the budget request to introduce new policies, programs, or changes they would like to see enacted.

NOTE: The Presidential Budget Request was finally released at the end of May and does NOT include traditional protections from killing healthy wild horses and burros or selling them without limitation (slaughter). See more HERE.

This request from the President formally kicks off the crafting of bills in both the House and Senate. Both the House and Senate have Appropriations Committees that have subcommittees that oversee spending for various federal agencies. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is overseen by the Department of Interior. The United States Forest Service (USFS) is overseen by the United States Department of Agriculture. You can find the subcommittees under the tab on the Senate website HERE and the House website HERE.

Your representative does not have to sit on a subcommittee to send a request on funding. In fact, each of your representatives has someone in their office (aide) that works on public lands issues (that includes wild horses and burros). You can meet with them and ask that they make the request because the issue is important to their constituency (those that vote in the district).

As budgets are being crafted there will be hearings in both the House and Senate. You can find the hearings under the “hearings” tab on the Senate website HERE and the House website HERE. These hearings range from Oversight, Emergency Funding and what is called a “Markup” when the draft of the spending bill is debated and changed. Early hearings in the Appropriations debate include events such as the Secretary of the Interior appearing before the committee, making a statement and addressing questions.

July 18, 2025 UPDATE: We are here. The House version has been drafted and it includes the prohibitions against killing healthy wild horses and burros or selling them without limits. The Senate version has not been drafted. These bills have a long way to go before being finalized. Keep calling your lawmakers.

Once these bills pass out of subcommittee and the full committee, they then go to open floor debate for passage of a final bill out of both House and Senate. Then these bills go into “reconciliation” to hammer out differences and then back to the President and signed into law releasing funding.

All of this should happen before the new fiscal year begins on October 1. If it does not happen, short-term bills that fund the government for (usually) a quarter (3 months) until a bill can be finalized fore full funding for the year.

That is how it is supposed to work.

You should still use the calendar above to base the language of  your calls even in the current chaos.

Right now you should be calling to urge “programmatic requests” to the 2026 budget. From May through September the word you use, after the drafts are released from subcommittees, is to “amend language in the Appropriations bill” to add (or take away) something you want (or do not want).

The language in the fiscal year 2025 budget was generated in 2024. Things like the prohibition against killing healthy wild horses and burros and the prohibition against sales without limits (slaughter) were maintained. The language basically maintained the status quo of the BLM Wild Horse and Burro program direction negotiated and adopted first in 2018 and fully in the 2020 plan budget (the public knows this agenda by the name the document carried through the lobby groups that pushed it, “Path Forward”). The “Path Forward” was put forth after the 2017 Presidential Budget Request (for fiscal 2018) called for lifting prohibitions noted previously. (more HERE)

No regular appropriations bills have yet been enacted for fiscal year 2025. The partisan House bills and bipartisan Senate bills have serious differences. Federal agencies are operating under short-term continuing resolutions, which basically let operations continue at the prior year’s spending rate. A budget resolution (short-term bill) was passed, but only until mid-March.

Instead of seeing the Presidential Budget Request for 2026, that would clearly outline the administrations position and discloses actual data on line items, we are seeing funding that was already approved by Congress frozen and upheaval in federal agencies… and frankly, absolute chaos.

Although the Presidential Budget Request has not been made public (with all supporting documentation), we see references in agency department memos referencing the “Presidential Budget Request, 2026.” Regular process and transparency are out the window.

However, the subcommittees in both the House and Senate are already working on the 2026 budget and have set March 17 as the deadline for programmatic funding requests… without any actual administration position being disclosed through the (missing) formal Presidential Request. 

With so much chaos right now, making calls to your lawmakers to make sure that ensuring protection of wild horses and burros remains a priority for the American people does not “fall off the radar” is a good idea. You could ask that they propose an amendment to the fiscal year 2025 budget that will be voted on before March 14. Or, you can ask that they make a programmatic funding request for the fiscal 2026 budget and submit it to the subcommittee. (Ideas from the 2024 letter)

Or you could make one simple call that blankets both any proposed gutting of basic protections in both the 2025 and 2026 debate does not happen. (more HERE)

Call the Congressional Switchboard at: (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to your representatives. Tell them: Public lands must be left in the public domain and not given away or sold. Wild horses and burros on the range and in holding must not be killed or sold to slaughter.

WHE will keep up the legal battle. Can you please make sure Congress does not forget that our wild horses and burros matter to the American people?

Additional indications of administration direction beyond the (missing) Presidential Budget Request

We do know that on January 28, BLM confirmed the published roundup schedule and the massive removal in the Rock Springs Complex (Adobe Town, Salt Wells) of over 3,600 wild horses is on track and others being tracked by the public such as Kiger/Riddle. This indicates that BLM expects continued funding at the existing levels for removals.

The new Secretary of the Interior, Doug Burgum, has not issued any budget requests at this time. He has been visiting Governor’s Associations and meeting with special interests. No official documents have been released from his office since the Secretarial Orders to “Unleash American Energy.”

We do know that the Wild Horse and Burro Program is being debated for deep budget cuts similar to what happened in 2017. In a recent interview with the Reno Gazette Journal, Mark Amodei (R-NV) who sits on the House Interior subcommittee, openly confirmed what our team members are hearing behind the scenes (the program is literally on the chopping block and that many western states are pushing to do away with federal protections altogether).

Changes in the Wild Horse and Burro Program can hit two ways: Funding that allows actions and creates “legal authority from Congress or through a Directive from the Secretary of Interior exercising an authority granted by Congress. As an example: Even though there is no direct funding line item to complete formalization of a concise and enforceable welfare policy, the Secretary of Interior could direct that one be completed by issuing a Memorandum because “managing humanely” is a directive of law passed by Congress.

We are watching all avenues closely.

Our team is watching for the official 2026 Presidential Budget Request (that will set the tone for the coming years) in both the budget debate and BLM field office priorities. We are also watching speeches being given by Secretary of Interior Burgum at events for special interests to see if we can get any indication of changes in formal position on the Wild Horse and Burro Program. 

We will update you with any news. 

We need your support to keep our critical work alive. We must keep active litigation running to conclusion and launch new cases as needed to keep a strong line of defense.  

All of our work is only possible with your support. We thank you for keeping the critical work we do at WHE running for our wild ones.