SIGN ON: Tell the BLM to END the AIP cash incentive, not increase it >>

The following is from the American Wild Horse Campaign:

You may have seen that, this week, the Property and Environment Research Center (PERC) released a report praising the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) controversial Adoption Incentive Program (AIP), which pays individuals $1,000 per animal to adopt up to four wild horses and burros a year. Unfortunately, this report not only ignores the consequences of the AIP, but it calls for increasing the cash incentive payments that are sending thousands of wild horses and burros into the slaughter pipeline. Further, this report supports the status quo of roundups and removals and minimizes the importance of scientific, affordable, and publicly acceptable wild horse conservation solutions.

We know the AIP has been a disaster and using this report to justify the continuation of the program would mean more beloved wild horses and burros in the slaughter pipeline. Will you take a moment to protect wild horses and burros from slaughter by calling on the BLM to abandon the cash incentives, not increase them?

Since 2020, the BLM has rounded up over 50,000 wild horses and burros and adopted out a mere 15,000 through the AIP. During the same timeframe, our Investigations Team has identified over 2,100 BLM-branded wild horses and burros in kill pens. This is just a fraction of the true total since most kill pens don’t publicly advertise these animals before shipping them to slaughter.

Cash incentives are not a solution for addressing the animal welfare crisis created by the BLM’s roundup and removal program. It’s indisputable that the continuation of the cash incentives is placing the 64,000 wild horses and burros in the BLM’s holding system at risk of slaughter. We MUST speak up on behalf of these animals and stop this slaughter pipeline! Please join us in urging the BLM to end the cash incentives for the AIP.

Our investigation – which resulted in a 2021 groundbreaking front-page exposé in the New York Times – identified over a dozen groups of related individuals that have been defrauding taxpayers out of thousands of dollars by adopting multiple rounds of AIP animals and then sending them to kill pens once the cash incentives clear their bank accounts. In some cases, these nefarious adopters go back just days after being awarded title to adopt their next round of animals.

Unfortunately, this crisis has only gotten worse since our investigation began, as the BLM continues to round up more and more mustangs and burros every year. In fact, the influx of AIP wild horses and burros into slaughter auctions has far exceeded the capacity of rescue organizations trying to save them.

But, it’s vital that the BLM end the AIP cash incentive, not increase it. Instead of handing out cash payments, the BLM should offer a noncash veterinary voucher to support responsible adopters and offset the initial care of adopted wild horses and burros. But to make that happen, we need to raise our collective voices and demand the change these innocent animals desperately need.

Please take a moment to send a letter to the Director of the BLM and urge them to stop the cash incentives and instead, offer a veterinary voucher to incentivize responsible mustang and burro adoptions!

Thank you,

Team AWHC