Great piece, thanks Tyler! I didn’t see this before sending out my take on the election results yesterday and, if I had, my take would have been better for it. I agree with most of your analysis, with the exception of this headline conclusion:
I fear the policy landscape for farmed animal protection work is looking more and more bleak.
I think that’s true of the EATS Act, which could really hurt state ballot initiative work. But I’m not sure it’s true more broadly:
I don’t think the abolitionist ballot measures did any worse than they would have if brought in prior years. “Banning meat” has always been incredibly unpopular. For the same reason, it’s not clear to me that politicians opposing banning meat indicates a change of opinion, vs. just an increase in salience of the debate, which may or may not be a good thing.
We’ve always had opponents on the left and the right in politics. As James Ozden points out, we now also have more public supporters on the right than ever before. I’m not sure if they’ll be able to affect policy, but we may have a better shot than in any prior administration.
The state cultivated meat bans are bad signals, though they’re almost certainly preempted by federal law. I agree there’s a risk that a Trump FDA could ban cultivated meat nationally. But I think it’s more likely they’ll deregulate FDA policy in a way that helps cultivated meat.
Of course, there’s huge uncertainty on all this. And none of the above makes me think we should prioritize US policy work for farmed animals. Instead, I continue to think that our best opportunities lie elsewhere.
Great piece, thanks Tyler! I didn’t see this before sending out my take on the election results yesterday and, if I had, my take would have been better for it. I agree with most of your analysis, with the exception of this headline conclusion:
I think that’s true of the EATS Act, which could really hurt state ballot initiative work. But I’m not sure it’s true more broadly:
I don’t think the abolitionist ballot measures did any worse than they would have if brought in prior years. “Banning meat” has always been incredibly unpopular. For the same reason, it’s not clear to me that politicians opposing banning meat indicates a change of opinion, vs. just an increase in salience of the debate, which may or may not be a good thing.
We’ve always had opponents on the left and the right in politics. As James Ozden points out, we now also have more public supporters on the right than ever before. I’m not sure if they’ll be able to affect policy, but we may have a better shot than in any prior administration.
The state cultivated meat bans are bad signals, though they’re almost certainly preempted by federal law. I agree there’s a risk that a Trump FDA could ban cultivated meat nationally. But I think it’s more likely they’ll deregulate FDA policy in a way that helps cultivated meat.
Of course, there’s huge uncertainty on all this. And none of the above makes me think we should prioritize US policy work for farmed animals. Instead, I continue to think that our best opportunities lie elsewhere.