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Motion of the Council of Allegheny County urging the United States Congress to defeat H.R. 4417 and S. 2019, collectively known as the Ending Agricultural Trade Suppression Act.
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Whereas, as of mid-2023, voters and legislators in over a dozen states have passed laws protecting farmed animals from a variety of practices in the factory farming industry due to their cruelty to the animals involved, including bans on intensive confinement in systems such as gestation crates, veal crates, and battery cages; and
Whereas, in late June of 2023, members of the United States Congress have introduced federal legislation that would largely or completely override these state legislative actions; and
Whereas, this federal legislation, known as the Ending Agricultural Trade Suppression (EATS) Act (introduced in the House and Senate respectively as H.R. 4417/ S. 2019), could strip states and localities of their right to impose standards or conditions on the production or manufacturing of agricultural products sold or offered for sale in interstate commerce when those standards differ from federal law or the laws of other states; and
Whereas, the EATS Act expressly prohibits “[t]he government of a State or a unit of local government within a State” from imposing “a standard or condition on the preharvest production of any agricultural products sold or offered for sale in interstate commerce if the production occurs in another State; and the standard or condition is in addition to the standards and conditions applicable to the production pursuant to Federal law and the laws of the State and unit of local government in which the production occurs”; and
Whereas, the EATS Act expressly provides that any "person, including a producer, a transporter, a distributer, a consumer, a laborer, a trade association, the Federal Government, a State government, or a unit of local government, that is affected by a regulation of a State or unit of local government that regulates...
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