Investigate Earth Conspiracy Podcast - Inside The Fight For Ethical Science | Lawyers and Activists Speak Out

Episode Date: April 3, 2025

In this episode, we dive into the critical fight for ethical science and why it's more important now than ever. While most people remain unaware, the cruel and unethical experiments inflicted on animals in labs across the country could very well extend to us. If we allow powerful organizations and the government to continue operating without accountability, their disregard for ethical boundaries will inevitably reach human lives. Laboratories across America are not only conducting horrific experiments on animals but also testing deadly viruses with the potential to wipe out civilization. After the trauma of COVID-19, many of us felt like unwilling participants in a dangerous experiment. But imagine enduring that reality with no voice, no rights, and no way to speak out. Joining us today are passionate advocates fighting for change: Rebeka Robinson with Dane 4 Dogs, Attorney Wayne Hsiung, Co-Founder of the Simple Heart Initiative, and Attorney Steffen Seitz from the Animal Activist Legal Defense Project (AALDP). Together, we expose the disturbing truths behind unethical testing and explore what can be done to ensure compassion and accountability in science.

A new place, a new home for a while, let me feel like nothing to hold me back, tear my time, just enjoy the ride. Nothing about, life is good best I've ever felt. Hello and welcome to Investigator Earth podcast. I'm your host, Chad, alongside my beautiful wife, Sherry. On tonight's episode, we're going to be talking about animal research, but we also have some very, very special guest on the show tonight. We have Rebecca Robinson with Dains for Dogs.

We have Wayne Chung. He is the co-founder of the Simple Heart Initiative and Stefan Sites. He is an animal activist and legal defense project, also known as AALDP. We've already had Justin Goodman on our show once before. He is with White Coat Waste Project, and we dove pretty deep into that. Obviously, Sherry and I are both animal lovers. We do have a beagle ourselves, which is essentially like our son, Sherry. He's definitely my son.

Sometimes my daughter is like Sherry. She's like, Mom, you love the dog more than me. Yeah, for sure. And so once we started figuring out about kind of some of the animal research that has been done, especially over the past four years after COVID, all this stuff, Sherry went pretty deep in the research. And this affects all of us. It affects taxpayer dollars, but also is and are these studies actually needed? So we're going to go ahead and open the floor up to our very special guest.

Rebecca Robinson with Dains for Dogs, give us a little bit of your background where you are from, how you got into this initiative. Yeah, first of all, thank you for having us. I think we're all really pleased to be here. I'm Rebecca Robinson. I'm the founder of Dane for Dogs, which is a nonprofit based out of Madison, Wisconsin. I got involved with this because I was living in Madison, just a resident there, animal lover, and heard about Wayne. and other activists who went into a facility called Ridgelan Farms and rescued three beagles from there. And at the time, I had no idea that that facility even existed so close to my house.

And so I got together with some of my friends and thought we needed to do something about this. Awesome. And Wayne, you went to do some rescue out here. And we're going to talk about that a little bit later in the show. But give us a little bit of your background. What got you involved in this? And what is the Simple Heart Initiative? Yeah.

You know, it's funny that because everyone has a story about when their background, when their background got them involved in the work we do. And my stories that I saw dogs being tortured and killed when I was a kid. But the reality is that's not enough because there's lots of Chinese people who see dogs being tortured and killed. And frankly, unbeknownst a lot of Americans, there are lots of dogs being tortured and killed in the United States. And there still aren't enough people who are aware of this and more importantly, doing something about it. So I think the real answer is to be blunt, I had a terrible childhood, and my dog was my best friend. And, you know, what your wife just said about having a dog is a family member resonates very much with me because dogs have not just been my best friends throughout my entire life.

They've been family. Yeah, for sure. That I can only imagine. And Stefan, you are AALDP and animal activists. Are you an attorney? And Wayne, are you also an attorney, by the way? I am, much to surprise of the people who see the work I'm doing, I'm still a license attorney. Nice.

They're trying to take my license away. They failed so far. Yes, that's a great thing. Stefan, give us a little bit of your background, how you got involved as well. Yes, I'm a lawyer for the Animal Activist Legal Defense Project, as you've mentioned. And we're a clinic located at the University of Denver, Sturm College of Law. And we are, our whole project, like the whole mission of our project is to represent animal activists, whistleblowers, anyone who's standing up for animals. and needs a lawyer in their corner.

And so the way I got involved in this work is that I'd heard about some of the amazing work that Wayne was doing, rescuing animals, but then being criminally charged for it. So I was actually in law school is when I first began working on some of these cases. And Wayne has continued to get into good trouble as I have a bunch of other activists. And so I've been lucky to work on these kinds of cases. Wow. And that's what brought me to this particular case where I've gotten to work with Dane for dogs and trying to bring a prosecutor to go after original farms.

Yeah. So, and I want to also just, I guess, Dane for Dogs, what is your mission exactly? So you work with these guys as well, but like what is your kind of overarching mission for Dains for Dogs? Are you out there kind of aligning, whether it be activist groups, protest, whatever, how does that all work? The mission of Dane for Dogs is to end the breeding sale and use of dogs and cats in painful or distressing experimentation in Dane County, Wisconsin.

And what we learned was unfortunately Dane County, Wisconsin is a hot, bed of dog experimentation, which we had no idea, but Ridgelham Farms is the second largest research puppy mill in the country. And then Lab Corps also experiments on about 5,000 dogs a year. And then UW Madison also experiments on dogs. And so between those three entities around Madison, Wisconsin, unfortunately, it is a hotbed. And so that's why, you know, we live there. We learned about this. And that's why we're focusing primarily on Dane County and Wisconsin as a Yeah, Wayne, I do have to ask, obviously, you got in some trouble, it sounds like, and we'll get in that in just a second. But is number one animal research needed? I think that's what so many people often ask. And most times when we think about animal research, we think of little mice, you know, they don't really have any feelings or any of this stuff. And that's kind of how they push it out there. But obviously, when you start hearing about dogs and even the monkeys and, you know, we have, we live here in South Carolina. We have Monkey Island here. We have the Alpha, Genesis research facility, which, you know, I'm sure you guys heard when there was like 38 of them

that escaped the lab. Yes, I was like, the bananas are on my porch and the light is on. Yeah. Come to me. Sherry was literally hoping that she would find the monkey in our front yard. And I was like, well, you know, is animal research needed, Wayne? The fallacy of the necessary evil is one of the causes of the great. greatest atrocities in human history.

And that might seem like an exaggerated term, atrocity, until you hear about what happens to these dogs for the dumbest shit imaginable. Am I allowed to curse? Yeah, yeah, you're right. But we're talking about things like artificial sweeteners, laundry detergent. Do we really need another laundry detergent? You know, some of the dogs from Virgiline have been forced-fed laundry detergent to the point they're vomiting, blood, and dying.

And the laundry list of stupid things these dogs are, experiment it on for is mind-blowing. Having said that, even if there are some experiments that do have some value for human health and science, that doesn't mean it's necessary because we still have to make a moral choice as to whether it's okay to torture and kill another conscious being humankind's best friend, dogs, in order to obtain some scientific benefit. And just as we've decided through the course of history that we cannot exploit and kill and torture other human beings for science, you know, and a generation ago, that wasn't necessarily true. You have these famous experiments like the Tuskegee syphilis experiments on black Americans or the human radiation

experiments on autistic orphaned children. And now we realize, oh, those things were super messed up, and we shouldn't have done them, even if they did have some scientific value. And this idea that we have to torture and kill dogs for some scientific benefit is fallacious on both of those levels. First, most of these experiments are experiments that are totally unnecessary by any scientific logic. But second, even if there is some scientific logic behind some of the experiments, the ultimate question about whether we should torture and kill dogs is not just a scientific one. It's a moral one. And the moral answer to that question is absolutely it's not necessary. To the contrary, it should be forbidden in any decent and reasonably ethical society to take the most vulnerable, beautiful, loving creatures on this earth and subjectate them to torture.

and death. And anybody who's got a dog understands that. Oh, absolutely. Stefan, I was reading your essay about voluntary prosecution. Can you tell us a little bit about what that means? And then I would like Wayne to follow up and tell me, is this what you do, is voluntary prosecution? Sure. And Wayne is one of the co-authors on that piece as well. So we can certainly chime in. But the basic idea of this voluntary prosecution piece is that throughout history, when activists have been trying to affect change, but they've been unable to to do that for some reason or another, often because institutional channels are blocked, there's corruption, or certain individuals simply didn't have the political status to be able to speak,

that what activists have done is they've actually put their own freedom on the line, and they've stood up for what they believe was right. And then they've actually gone to trial and used that trial as a public platform, but they've essentially invited the government to come after them so that they could make a case to the public at large of what they believed in. And that's what we've seen in some of these animal cases, including the one that kick started all of this in Dane County, where Wayne and a few other activists entered a facility, entered Ridgel, took video footage of what was going on inside and rescued three beagles.

And they invited the government to go after them. And part of the reason for that is really to dramatize how upside down our legal system is, that instead of going after the company that's industrially torturing and abusing dogs, they decided to go after the three heroic individuals who entered to rescue those dogs. And so I think the idea behind voluntary prosecution is we can actually use trial. this format that all of us are familiar with to dramatize just how upside down the law is and hopefully use that as a way of fixing the law. Yeah.

And so, Wayne, you went into this facility, I guess, with a couple other people. How did that work out? How did you actually get in the facility? How did all that play out? Yeah. So we just walked in through an unlocked door and started taking photos and video. And we saw, you know, a beagle spinning in her cage. Over a period of two hours, I think I saw her stop.

like a handful of times and usually only for like a second or two before she'd start spinning again and you know if you saw any dog in the situation in any environment you'd say like there's something deeply wrong with this dog this dog you know need some help there's something there's something hurting her she's sick she's traumatized in some way and so we did what what i'd do of any dog frankly um and we ultimately were prosecuted for it i faced multiple felony charges along two co-defendants was facing up to 16 years in prison and a day before the trial was going to start they'd dropped all the charges against us. And I want to say part of the reason for that, though, was this theory of voluntary prosecution that's worked with such brilliant effect

over the last hundred years of American history, whether it's Rosa Parks or Susan B. Anthony or many of the other famous activists in American history. It only works when there's a community that rises up in response to the repression, right, that recognizes there's something deeply broken in a system where people who are just trying to stand up for their rights or the rights of other vulnerable beings are targeted. And I think the real story of success here and how we're going to get these beagles out is a story of a local community,

including people like Rebecca, realizing this truth about their local community, that their dogs being tortured. And even more importantly than that truth was another truth, which is, hey, if we do something about this, we can actually stop it. And that's what Rebecca and, you know,

Rebecca definitely took a lead on this, but I think Rebecca would say as well that there were so many people, including now state centers and even a judge. I mean, the judge, yeah, I mean, the judge made the right decision, but in many ways, unfortunately, it was a courageous decision because very often judges are pressured by the local political community and by, you know, local political influencers in various political parties, whether it's a Republican or Democratic Party, to not do the right thing.

And what Rebecca and her group did was really empower the local leaders by taking leadership themselves to, for once, do the right thing for these dogs. And that's a marvelous outcome for us all. And Wayne, right before we get to Rebecca, I do have one quick other question. Do you think maybe the charges also potentially were dropped because, I mean, you guys are attorneys. So you know how kind of court cases go and all that. But oftentimes when things do go to court, doesn't it kind of highlight that issue even, you know, on a much broader scale of, you know, if you're facing all these years in prison, multiple felonies, it makes the news. It makes this big ordeal. that really highlights the actual problem at hand, right?

100%,000%. And again, a lot of that is because the local community's response. If Rebecca had not been trying to pass ballot initiatives, organizing community events, drafting up ads, I mean, there was so much anger in the local community that was harnished to constructive effect by the local activist of Dane for dogs that, I mean, the honestly got truth is I just haven't done that much work on this campaign.

I wish I could brag more and say, like, I've done all these great things, but I actually haven't. It's like mostly Rebecca and the legal stuff. I mean, my name's on the petition, but Stefan wrote it. Like, I just kind of sat around and let people do work. And now we're at the brink of a pretty historic victory. Yes. But it's a team effort.

And importantly, you know, for everyone listening. And even for the two of you, I'm grateful to the two of you for taking on this subject because it's a hard, dark subject that most people like to talk about. I mean, they don't. Like literally, you can't even watch a movie where someone hurts a dog. There's this website that's like, do they kill the dog or something like that? just warns you if a dog is killed in a movie because people don't want to watch movies where dogs are killed. I know I hate watching it. And think about not just one dog being killed in a fictional

story, but thousands of dogs being tortured and caged for lies. I mean, it's really hard to deal with. And there are a lot of people in this community who didn't just deal with it. They stood up and decided to take action. And that's the key to change. And you're so right about that way, because when we did a podcast with Justin Goodman, we got a lot of negative rapport or like feedback on that because no one wants to hear about these realities. But I think it's so important that people do hear about it and know about it and do something about it and be active about it. If you don't like hearing it and you don't want it to happen, then stand up and do something and help your community stop this awful stuff they're doing. Yeah.

And with that said, Rebecca, you, you know, I was researching you as well. And it's almost like you were kind of the leader in this thing in Wisconsin, getting this whole thing started, getting the prosecutor. on it, looking at it. You know, I just applaud you for what you've done as just a citizen of Wisconsin and you've gone out of your way to help these poor animals. Tell me, like, how did you get involved of doing that? What were the steps that you did? And what can other people do to help you?

Yeah. Well, I want to say, I didn't start it. I learned about it because of Wayne's actions. And prior to Wayne, there were other activists who had tried to raise the alarm about Ridgelham Farms, too, right? So I think we are just on the tail end. or the current moment of a long line of activists who have put in so much work to raise attention around this issue. And so I'm really proud to be part of it, but I don't want to give any

impression that I have somehow started anything of this. But yeah, so what we've basically done, I got involved because of, again, Wayne's Rescue and learning about that. I have a degree in political science from UW Madison. And so my first thought was, hey, I vaguely remember learning about something about like citizen proposed ballot initiatives, maybe if we just tell the local community what's happening, surely people will shut this down, you know? And so at that time, that was kind of the thought. So we looked into it and sure enough that law allows for, if you gather a certain number of signatures, you can get an issue on the ballot. And so that's what we did. And now, you know, looking back, I kind of laugh because we did it in the wrong community.

We didn't even know where Ridgelham Farms was located because you couldn't Google Ridgeland Farms address at that time. And we didn't know Wayne. We didn't know the activists. We were just local animal lovers. And so we actually ran this ballot initiative in Mount Horib, which is a nearby village. But the facility itself is actually located in the town of Blue Mounds. And so that's how we got started. And unfortunately, we lost that ballot initiative.

But then we went on to run another ballot initiative in Spring Green, which we did win, because there was another research puppy mills springing up there. And then since then, we've passed another five ordinances in communities across Wisconsin as they saw what was happening. And they were saying, you know, we don't want this in our community either. This is a nuisance. We don't want these types of facilities coming to our community. And so they've also passed what I believe are groundbreaking first in the country

ordinances banning dog and cat experimentation, which I think is pretty incredible when you think of Wisconsin. You know, you don't normally think of Wisconsin being California or super progressive in that sense. But I think people love dogs. And so they're willing to take that stand. Yeah. It's kind of interesting because. Can I actually say something about that?

Yeah, go ahead. Because I think it's so important Rebecca did because most people are so terrified at making mistakes and taking risks that they don't do anything because they think the system's too big. I'm going to look bad. Someone's going to like make funning on social media if I make a mistake. Rebecca just did. and even just on this podcast, acknowledging, look, I tried something. It was a risk and it was a stupid mistake. I literally tried to ban puppy mills in the wrong city.

More people need to be willing to do that. Like if we're actually going to create change, we have to be willing to do that. Because big corporations do this all the time. They have unlimited money essentially to try all sorts of ridiculous shit. And, you know, like they're literally wasting money on all these dog experiments. It mean nothing. They make mistakes all the time and dogs get tortured as a result. When they're making mistakes, a dog gets tortured.

we get make a mistake, all you have to do is come on a podcast and admit you made a mistake, and then you win when you learn from that experience. And like more people need to have that grittiness and that resolve if we're actually going to create change, not just for animals, but frankly, even in your personal life. And I think this is the one concern I have about the world right now is like the lack of risk tolerance and the lack, this fear that's gripping the country right now that prevents people from doing things. That is extremely dangerous. And that is a thing more than anything else that Rebecca represents as like, like a solution to that problem. Just get out there and do stuff. You're going to mess up.

It's totally fine. You're going to learn from messing up. And you might get to the point where you're about to get a legendary victory for thousands about thousands of sentient banks. Yeah. No, I 100% agree with that. And, you know, this is for in large part what we have found has become a bipartisan issue, and at least for our listeners. And I think that's a good thing. I think it somewhat actually started during COVID when the whole Anthony Falsci thing happened and they started talking about Anthony Valti and the Beagles and they connected to Beagles, Anthony Valti. Obviously, you realize that, you know, I don't know how many labs there are in the United States. I think there are tons. I think there are way more than

most people realize. But I do think at the very least that put people on both sides of the aisle kind of in a position to care enough to want to try to do something about that, which is actually part of the reason why we even ever heard about the Beagle experiments and all this stuff was because you saw it on mainstream media. You saw the Anthony Apology connection, NIH, and all this. And then the funding that went to that. Stefan, I do have a question for you, you know, as an attorney as well, do you feel like that the, do you feel like this actually is a bipartisan issue? Do you feel like there's one party that's likely to help over the other? And how do you see this playing out in the future, especially with, with it, with it just being, I think this maybe never been as highlighted

as it has been over the past few years. But what do you see forward for this? Yeah, I absolutely think it's a bipartisan issue. I think dog lovers are, there's Democratic dog lovers and Republican dog lovers. And obviously dogs themselves are not Democrats or Republicans and just want to be loved and to have loving homes. So I think we've seen that in Congress. We've seen that in local legislatures. We've seen that in Wisconsin across the board that this is an issue that spans the political divide.

I also think that's why it's so important. to get the word out and to do what Rebecca's been doing, organizing the community, to do the kinds of things that Wayne has been doing where he has a big platform is able to educate people about what's going on. Because the main impediment is that people don't know or feel too scared to act against these corporations that are profiting off of all of these things that are doing these horrible things to dogs. I think if it were to come more into the limelight, then we would see political change on both sides. I also want to say, I mean, we were talking about some of these things, and it's obviously extremely dark what's happening to a lot of these dogs. And it's a really depressing subject. I totally understand people who just, you know, would rather not listen to it, would rather spend their time doing something that makes them feel better. But I will say there's a huge silver lining to this that actually is extremely happy, which is that there's a lot of momentum right now.

Just a couple of years ago, there's a giant facility in northern Virginia that had about 4,000 beagles who were also kept in deplorable conditions. that facility was shut down and all of those beagles are rehomed. And any time I'm feeling overwhelmed by the horrible footage I've seen, if I just look up some of the pictures of these dogs who have now been adopted by loving homes, I mean, it immediately makes you feel warm about the world and makes you feel optimistic that this is a fight, not only that we can win, but that we will win and that the scale of this is really significant. And so there's a real silver lining here that there's a lot going on now where we can hopefully rescue 3,000 more beagles and get them into loving homes.

And yet, to go back to original question, I think politicians on both sides of the aisle and certainly citizens across the board overwhelmingly support that. Yeah, I'm in that Facebook group, the Envigo Adopty Beagles. So I love to see their little pictures every day and how they're coming along and what they went through. But, you know, a lot of these beagles that I see on this page, they're still running around in circles like you saw, Wayne, when you rescued. And I believe you became that that beagle became your pet. Am I correct? Pretty close. I mean, Julie is like my stepdaughter. No, she's actually with my good friend, Diana and Berkeley. I live in San Francisco. I thought about taking her, but at the time I had

another rescue who was a rescue from a dog fighter who was super dog aggressive. And yeah, we didn't handle it. But Julie's still a huge part of my life and she's one of my best friends in the world. And I feel very lucky. Even though she like a lot of these beagles, she still does spin. Every time she gets nervous, she starts frantically running around a circle again. But she's got a beautiful life of the happy family. And yeah. Why do you think they spin, by the way? What is the spinning thing going on?

Yeah, it's just a trauma response. It's, I mean, so there's this thing called stereotypic behavior that I think it's, it's mammalian and it's a mammalian and an avian reaction. You see this in birds too. But basically, normally when you experience stress, stress by its nature, is telling your body you need to avert this stimulus, whatever it is, whether it's like physical pain, fear, whatever it is. And your body and your mind are telling you, get away. But when you have an animal trapped in a cage and these beagles live in two foot by four foot cages, sometimes

for seven, eight years about basically ever coming out or coming out for a few moments to be, you know, forcibly impregnated and then thrown right back into the cage, that was going to be Julie's life for seven, eight years. But when she gets stressed, there's nowhere to go because you're trapped in this tiny little cage that is your entire life. I mean, they don't even know what it's like outside. And Julie, especially, because she was blind. She didn't, I mean, she didn't know like comprehension of what the world was like outside of this cage. And she'd hear things. She'd see things. Maybe someone mishandle her or manhandle her in a way that caused her pain and fear. And, you know, so animals, uh, vertebrates, including birds and mammals, develop these

stereotypies, which is just a repetitive behavior. If there's nothing else you can do, sometimes you'll see like head bobbing. And you see this in children who are traumatized, too. like sometimes you'll see like a hit a kid who's just bobbing their head over and over again because they've been beaten their entire lives. You see what dogs do. And these dogs because they're suffering from so much abuse, they, you know, the statistics in confinement show sometimes it's like 90, 95% of the animals develop these stereotypic behaviors, including head bobbing, spinning, bar chewing, all sorts of behaviors. I mean, I've estimated that when I walked through the facility, probably even in the two hours I was there and looking around at the dogs, probably one in five of the dogs was exhibiting. some very, very obvious sign of trauma, like psychological trauma and torment. And I don't know who this question is best for. Rebecca, maybe you can answer this,

but where is the primary funding coming from for these labs in these facilities? I'm not sure I am the best person to answer that. Maybe Wayne knows. Yeah. So at the end of the day, the largest fund of animal experimentation around the world is the taxpayer. So sadly, our money is fueling animal experimentation to the, the tune of billions upon billions of dollars. The estimates are that the NIH provides about half of its total grant money to experiments involving animal testing. This is despite the fact that many top-notch peer-reviewed journals, such as the Lancet, which is among the top medical journals in the world, have concluded that for both ethical and scientific reasons, animal experimentation should

probably be done away with. But it is shocking. Like, I mean, so, for example, one of the reasons originally got my radar was because back almost 20 years ago in 2006, there were these stories about the University of Wisconsin buying like hundreds of dogs over a very short period of time. I think like in mid-2000s, and a good friend of my Jeremy Beckham, who I think lived in Madison at the time, told me, you know this university that is basically funded by taxpayer dollars is buying like hundreds and hundreds of beagles and like they're disappearing in this scary-ass lab? And this same university has been implicated in some of those horrific animal experiments in American history, including torturing baby monkeys by taking their moms away

and watching how traumatized they are by losing their moms. And this same university, funded by taxpayer money, is buying hundreds and hundreds of dogs. And exactly at the same time that Jeremy was discovering, there's all these weird dogs that are just disappearing into the University of Wisconsin. There are also whistleblower accounts that were reported to the USDA, probably employees of the company, saying there are dangerous and unsanitary conditions and huge piles of burning dogs. So hundreds of dogs are going to be in Wisconsin, University of Wisconsin. Hundreds of dogs are apparently ending up in huge piles and being burned for reasons that we still haven't been able to figure out. And the USDA did absolutely nothing about it.

So long story short, one of the sad parts of the story is the fact that this is not just about the abuse of animals. It's about the corruption of democracy because things that none of us can barely even fathom exist in the world are not only, don't only exist, but they're being supported with our taxpayer money. because of the corruption in our political system. Yeah. No, that makes complete sense. And Rebecca, I mean, I know, I know obviously in your area, do you guys have a lot of protests or that type of stuff, you know, around this actual facility?

And a facility like yours that you are around in, what is it, is it Dane County, Wisconsin? Is that where it is? Yes. Okay. Are there a lot of those facilities across the United States very similar? So Richland Farms. is unique, right? It's the second largest in the country, but there certainly are other ones.

There's another one just in Spring Green, which is about 30 miles west or so. And that's much smaller, but they have about 300 hounds that they sell for experimentation as well. But in general, there's kind of two main players in this, so Marshall in New York and then Ridgelen Farms now. And of course, Invego was one of the largest ones, but they were shut down, as Stefan mentioned. So what Dane for Dogs primarily does is we take on, we kind of have done sections, right? So we started off with the ballot initiative. We honestly thought that would be it and we would shut them down. And since then we've learned, well, that didn't happen.

And then after that, we moved on to Spring Green because the residents there contacted us about this research puppy mill and asked for our help. And so we spent about two years or so in Spring Green. We filed lawsuits. We helped the residents attend village board meetings, town board meetings. county board meetings. It ended up being a whole thing where the village denied their conditional use permit and then the research puppy mill sued the village and so there were lawsuits flying back and forth and ultimately the research puppy mill prevailed and ended up essentially bullying Spring Green into allowing them to stay there. But then that what that cascaded into was the nearby

community of Richland Center saw what was happening to their neighbors in Spring Green and said, we don't want that. So they passed the first. ordinance in the country, banning dog and cat experimentation and breeding and selling and using dogs and cats for painful experimentation. And so then we kind of went on a phase where we had other communities reach out to us and ask for help passing ordinances in their communities. So we did that for several years. And then Envigo was shut down and we got six of those beagles. So overnight, we turned into a foster and adoption organization where in 24 hours our volunteers turned into foster homes for six of these beagles. And then we were doing, you know, veterinarian appointments

to spay and spay them and vet adopters and things. And so we did that for a little while. And then we started preparing for Wayne's trial. And then we did the special prosecutor. And so it's just kind of been this momentum where these things almost happen. And we keep thinking, well, after this, we'll take a break. Well, after this, we'll take a break. And it's just kept going. stop. Yeah. With Stefan, with what she, what Rebecca is saying, what do you think the biggest legal obstacle is then?

You know, it seems like you have to go through hoops to get anything done. What do you think the biggest obstacle is? And do you start small and like, how do you go about doing this? I think the biggest legal obstacle is probably inertia, honestly. It's so I think the law, for example, is very clear in Wisconsin. You can't deprive dogs of adequate housing. you can't cause unnecessary pain and suffering. Those are criminal laws that apply to everyone.

They apply to you and me. They apply to Ridgelin. It doesn't matter how big you are or how much money you make off the dogs. They apply to them as well. But the problem is that the political actors that exist, the district attorney, for example, in Dane County, the sheriff's office, you know, the police department, etc. I think all of them just sort of turned a blind eye to what's been happening at Ridgel.

Some of that I think is probably just force of habit, that they're like, well, surely, there can't be crimes on this scale happening right under our noses. Some of it is also that dogs, unlike human beings, can't speak up for themselves and go to the police department and file a complaint. So they require courageous individuals like Wayne to stand up for them and publicize their stories. So I think one of the things we've learned here is that there are so many hoops to jump through and it is very difficult and we'll certainly get a ton of pushback from the industry from original itself. But the law is on our side. And some of it is just being able to find people or willing to put in the time and the effort and the courage,

like Rebecca, like Wayne. And then once you get the ball moving, I mean, we've had, I feel like the momentum is built very quickly over the last, you know, year or so. And so I think that's really what happens is it can take a long time to get that momentum, to get that inertia, you know, to overcome that inertia. But once you get the ball rolling, the momentum can hopefully pick up quite quickly. And I feel like that's what we're seeing with this case. Yeah, do you guys have hope for this new administration. And Wayne, I'll go to you. The new administration may hate or love good old Trump, but regardless, like, how do you

feel like this, you know, obviously with NIH, they have a new director, Dr. Jay Batacharya, I think is his name. I'm probably definitely screwing that name up. But because I've already screwed y'all's last name up completely. No, I think he said it right. Did I? Okay. But is, I mean, is he a pivotal role in this potentially as an NIH director and how much, you know,

how much influence does he have over these labs and funding? Are you guys trying to get me in trouble? You know I live in San Francisco, right? Yeah, I know, right? You're trying to get me in trouble, honestly. Well, that's why I ask you. I'm going to say some good things about Trump right now, and I'm about to get canceled by my entire state.

I'm optimistic, and I think RFK Jr. is an iconoclast. I think he wants to do some wild stuff. I think some of the wild stuff I don't like, but at least in regard to animal testing, I like what RFK Jr. I like what Nancy Mace, you're in South Carolina, so, you know, she's in your neck of the woods. I like what these people are saying.

I mean, R.K. Jr. is called industrial animal exploitation, unspeakable cruelty. And that's true. It is so bad, it's hard to even speak about. And, you know, it's ironic that Elon has been cutting all these programs that have nothing to do with his main complaint about government waste. but when you look back to what he was complaining about when Trump was running for president before he was elected, a lot of what they're complaining about was wasteful animal experiments. So, for example, I think one of the most viral post that Elon made about government waste was, if I call correctly, rats that had been injected with cocaine and sprayed with bobcat urine to see how they would respond to cocaine plus bobcat urine.

And they're just like, this is what our money is being spent on. and I don't think anyone would say kind of force-feeding rats, cocaine, and spraying the bobcat urine to see if they will fight each other is a useful kind of appropriation of government funds and tax-faring money. But a lot of what's happened since then, unfortunately, is, you know, I feel like they haven't really delivered on what they said they were going to do, which is cut things like that. But it's still really. I mean, I'm optimistic. And the reality is sometimes to make a system. correct and just, you have to break this system. And I think some of what the current administration

is doing is certainly breaking systems that probably shouldn't be broken, but some of these systems should be broken. And I'm glad they're doing it, frankly. Well, and I don't want to get anybody else canceled, but I got to ask this question as well, Justin Goodman, a white coat waste. You know, he was in front of Congress, actually not long ago. And where he was Nancy Mace and all of them, that kind of whole team. and one of the things that he particularly highlighted, and I'm not sure you guys might know about this, but whatever the trans, I guess it was the trans experiments. Was that on rats?

I'm not, I can't remember. I think it was the same ones. And after they did the transgender experiments is when they gave them cocaine or like a party drug for transgenders to see how they would overdose. But regardless, I mean, you know, how do you do experiments, no matter what you're feeling is on the subject, as far as the trans stuff goes on rats and mice. I mean, it just doesn't make any sense.

And I guess we had heard since then, I guess since Justin Goodman kind of pushed out in Congress, I think they have obviously also canceled that. But, you know, that's just, is that more ideological of why they would potentially fund experiments like that in, or what is it? I mean, it just doesn't make sense to me. Anybody that wants to go. I mean, if I can go out on limb and say, like, I think the trans stuff is really

stupid for Trump to target. I have trans fans. I think trans people are awesome and, you know, we should leave them alone and let them live beautiful lives, just like we should let every living being live a beautiful life. You all might not agree with that, and I think that's okay, too. You know, we're going to disagree about some things and we'll agree that mice shouldn't be tortured. But to me, I don't care if a mouse is trans or cis or male or female or big or little or furry or skinless, they should not be tortured. I don't care what that mouse is. I don't care what that dog is.

I don't think the dog or mouse cares either. I think the dog or mouse or human being carries about not being tortured and killed. And that's what should stop. So the trans stuff to me is a red herring. I think the anti-trans stuff, it's unfortunate it's gotten so polarized and politicized and I know this is in debate about trans stuff,

but I mean, I do have trans friends and I feel like I have to stick up for them. And I don't think it's cool what the administration is doing to trans people because trans people are people too. but we can have disagreements about that issue and still agree that mice should not be tortured. Yeah. And to your point, I want to ask Stefan this question. Stephen, I'm from Colorado and that's where I grew up. And I noticed you've done a lot of work against CSU, Colorado of Colorado State University.

Can you kind of tell me what went on there? And are they not developing a humongous bat lab, I guess, is what we've heard. at CUSU? Yeah, I'm not fully plugged into this. I've heard this as well. I should probably know better, seeing it's also in my backyard and be a little bit of a better citizen of Colorado.

But definitely, I mean, CSU is a giant research university that gets a ton of taxpayer funding. And so a lot of the stuff that Rebecca was talking about happening at UW Madison, the exact same stuff happens at CSU. They have a huge agricultural program. And one of the things that we've run into is that we try to get just transparency,

you know, not even like suing them to try to stop them from building something, just get documents. They say they're doing a study, for example, in which they're working with the cattle industry and trying to figure out how to slaughter cattle more efficiently, things like that. And we've worked with organizations that have essentially just done public records requests, asked for those documents, but like, you know, you talk about taking videos and pictures, can we get access to those? And they immediately invoked every possible exception. As soon as we pushed back, they said, well, maybe not this one, but how about this one? And we have to actually ultimately end up suing them to try to get clarity.

So I think that's illustrative of the problem, which is that universities like CSU, like UW Madison, but also private corporations, they know that this stuff is very unpopular. And so their first line of defense, I think, is usually obfuscating and hiding because they know even just the simple act of being able to publish what's going on in a lot of these places will result in enormous pushback. And so that's one of the things that we've been trying to do is pushback on that, try to provide some more transparency so that at least, you know, people can inform themselves. I mean, I think as soon as people see what's happening, they have the same reactions that all of us

have had on this call. Yeah. And I got to say, and I'm not at all trying to make it political, but, you know, there's been a lot of doctors, especially since COVID happened, that have come out in the forefront and they spoke out against what they believed was maybe what their opinion was, what their expertise was based on, hey, this is maybe how we should be treating COVID. We should be doing experiments on bats in China. We should not be, we should not have doctors here in the United States, which keeping in mind, for most people that don't know, you know, Dr. Ralph Barrett and some of these other doctors, they were actually the ones that were experimenting on the coronavirus before it ever even made its way into Wuhan Institute of Virology. And I guess my question is,

is that I think a lot of people, although yes, absolutely, this animal experimentation is extremely important. But I think if you look back over the past three years or four years, I think a lot of people also kind of think maybe they have been experimented on in some way, shape, or form. And I just wish there was a way that the two sides in whatever, because it almost seemed like during COVID, if you looked at any of the, you know, congressional hearings or whatever, it was always right versus left or left versus right. It seemed like the left wanted to protect this or the right wanted to do this. They want to call it this. Is there a way that somehow both of these issues are combined to where it's like, okay, not only do we not want experiments on animals

to happen because it's inhumane, it's horrific, but like we probably shouldn't be doing gain of function type research on viruses that could literally be civilization ending viruses in labs. And, you know, I don't know what they're testing in every degree on these beagles in the labs. I don't know if there are viruses that could actually spread from dogs to people. I don't know. But either way, have you guys done a lot of research on the gain of function stuff? And is that any way tied to some of y'all's, I guess, research as far as the animals go? I mean, I guess I could take that.

The 100% are testing the dogs with pathogens are super deadly. I mean, we exposed a study that was just in the last couple of years that Merck was commissioning to inject dozens of dogs of rabies, watches, they went psychotic, and basically ripped themselves to pieces a lot. I mean, like, that's what happens to the dog. of rabies. And we don't need another rabies vaccine. We have one. It's like basically 100% effective. They're like, I think something like five or 10 rabies cases around the country, always have unvaccinated dogs. It's not a problem. But Mark basically wanted to patent a new

vaccine and basically convince a lot of people, dupe a lot of people to pay for an expensive vaccine because it came from Mark and they were going to do it on original dogs. And original was going to do it on site. Like it was all being done on site. So I think, I mean, the point you're making is a sound one, which is if you allow the abuse of power, you also can be abused. Like all of us can be abused. You might think, like, oh, it's just like the poor person. Or again, the trans person. Sorry to be political. And I'm not saying the trans woman hasn't made mistakes. I think it's made a lot of mistakes. And I think like it totally overreached and like, you know, aggressively went after people for not using the right pronouns and all sorts of like stuff that

probably wasn't, didn't make a lot of sense. But the reason I think it's important to stand for animals, for trans people, for conservatives. I think conservatives are unfairly targeted sometimes and progressives should stand up for them too when they're fairly targeted on university campuses is the basic problem and the reason the United States government was like a beautiful experiment in self-governance is if you allow people to abuse power, then anyone can face abuse, right? Because in some context, there's always going to be some situation where you don't have the power. And this biomedical industry, you might think like, oh, they're doing all these awful things to dogs, but they're not going to hurt us. Well, if they get away with torturing these sentient

beings by covering it up by using government money and deceiving the public about what the money is actually being used for. Guess what? That same biomedical industry can be used against you, too, if it makes them a buck, right? And I think the gain of function research is just one example of this. So 100%. I think our fates in the face of the animals of this earth are intertwined because today it might be the dog they're torturing tomorrow that could be injecting you with something. You don't realize it's going to kill you. Yeah, we've had a lot of episodes on this podcast about, you know, We've talked a lot about conspiracies, which used to be conspiracies. You know, it seems like there's a lot of conspiracies are not so much conspiracies anymore.

If you look at some of these declassified documents, government experiments, you name it. It's just like you find out so much heinous stuff. Rebecca, for you, though, is it a move? Where are you guys at right now as far as this facility? I mean, have you made headway? Is this facility in anywhere close to being shut down at any point? Yeah, I think the tide has really. really turned. I think Wayne and Stefan, the Animal Activist Legal Defense Project, was such a

game changer for us in Wisconsin, just being able to file this lawsuit and then the absolute phenomenal organization and presentation. And I mean, it had never even occurred to us that we could do something like this, right? We're not lawyers. And so we don't know all the levers that we can pull. We just tried to raise noise and raise awareness about it, right? But bringing in the animal activist legal defense project and then having the whistleblowers come and testify, that was such a game-changing moment. That October hearing was really incredible. And I think that's when the tide really started to turn. And then when the judge released her 23-page statement, finding probable cause of felony animal cruelty at Ridgelham Farms, no longer was it just these animal activists,

animal extremists saying these wild outrageous things. Now it was a judge who had listened to the evidence and found probable cause of felony animal cruelty. That was huge. And after that, then, we've also got the veterinary examining board looking at the veterinarian licenses of the veterinarians working at Ridgeland Farms, because that's something, another angle that we need to be looking at as well. And then also the regulatory inspections that have been documenting for over 10 years, the conditions that are falling short of meeting Wisconsin standards,

routinely over and over they're finding puppies whose legs are falling through the grates. And that means they can't move and access food and water. So they're finding these violations over and over. And now finally, there are these three investigations that are ongoing, the criminal investigation, the veterinary investigation, and the regulatory investigation. And all three of those together have started within the last year. And so I really do feel like Ridgelham Farms is under pressure. In addition, there were recently just four of their buyers.

who came out and said they are no longer going to be buying dogs from Ridglin Farms because of this judge's decision and these investigations that are ongoing. And so as these buyers start to say, hey, we're not going to do business with this facility anymore as these investigations proceed. I really think that they're on the ropes. With you saying that you said that whistleblowers testified. And I'm thinking that it was past employees that came up and testified against this facility. can you tell me what were they seeing inside the facility? And then also, can you speak a little bit about the veterinarians, how they're letting people that are not certified as a veterinarian

to do surgical procedures on these beagles? Yeah, that's exactly what the former employees testified to was these were two guys who were essentially hired to clean the kennels at Ridgland Farms. That's what they were hired to do. But yet, as part of their job, jobs, they would be expected to hold these dogs down. These dogs were identified because they had problems with their eyelid. So if their eyelid was a bit inflamed, the way Ridgelham Farms handled that was they would ask these employees, again, not veterinarians, not vet techs. These are employees who

are hired to clean kennels. They would be asked to hold these dogs down so these dogs couldn't move, while another employee would take forceups and pinch the eyelid and then take scissors and cut off the eyelid. And that's the employees testified, you know, to just the lack of pain control, the lack of blood control, the absolute pain that they saw these dogs going through. And I think that was incredibly powerful testimony to see these two men both visibly shaken by what they had been expected to do. And I think that's another thing.

We need to recognize that this industry doesn't just harm the animals. It also harms the employees. years. Those men, when they took those jobs, did not know they would be asked to do that, right? They didn't know what they were walking into. And they found themselves in the situation where they've got, you know, a veterinarian or their manager staring at them and saying, look, this is what we do here. This is how it's done. And that causes trauma for the humans as well. And I think it's important to recognize that and have compassion for them as well. Now, are there just two veterinarians at this clinic or this facility or are there more?

So original farms is owned by veterinarians, and they have one on-staff veterinarian who is kind of the managing veterinarian of the facility. Wow, that's nuts. I mean, I can't believe you would be a veterinarian and own a facility like that. I have one more question for Rebecca. Rebecca, are they also implement? Oh, gosh, I'm so nervous talking to you guys because this is like my passion, but are they also cutting out vocal cords in these beagles at this facility? they used to. They stopped that in 2018, but prior to 2018, there were probably hundreds, if not thousands of dogs who, yes, had their vocal cords cut out again with no anesthesia and no pain relief. And sometimes I think it's almost easy to say, well, that was so long ago, you know, but it matters. Those dogs still matter. Even if it's beyond the statute of limitation, the fact that this was going on behind closed doors with, you know, these dogs, still suffered and their suffering matters.

I think it's important to recognize, okay, great, they're not doing it anymore, but it was done, and that's important, and that should be addressed. I don't think we definitively know they're not doing it at all. I don't think it's a standard practice, at least according to the employees, you testify at the veterinary examining board, that they're not doing it to all of them. I would be surprised if they're not being basically getting orders, because the way this industry works, it's like you can basically custom order your dog, however you'd like, And there probably are labs that are demanding that the dogs have their vocal cords cut.

And I would be shocked if Ridgeland had the ethical compunction to decide we're not going to do that when a customer orders it. So, yeah, my guess is it still happens and it's a gruesome practice. Just pulling the dog down, injecting them paralytic, ripping their vocal cords out. And the way the employees testified about it is just they throw the vocal cords like flapping around on the ground, just right into the drain. And there would be a bunch of vocal cords just sitting on the ground, you know, waiting to be washed down into the. into sewage. And by the way, so Ridgeline, Ridgelan is not an actual research facility, right?

It is basically a breeding facility that they then send to research facilities. So it does both. Our criminal complaint was filed against the breeding facility, partly because there is an exception to the animal quality laws in Wisconsin, which is a nonsense, disgusting, and inappropriate exception. But the exception does exist under Wisconsin law for educational teaching and research institutions. and their practices in regard to education teaching research. But Ridgeland has two licenses.

One is kind of a class R research license and one is a breeding license. And the facility that I investigated and we targeted this complaint is physically and just conceptually and legally distinct from the research facility. But they actually do perform experiments on dogs too. It's just much smaller number than the thousands that they're selling for experiments and for other purposes across the country and world. Yeah. It's like about 3,000 dogs who they have on site who they breed for sale and then a couple hundred max who they experiment on.

So, I mean, also just like the vast majority of their business is breeding for sale. Okay. And so you guys being attorneys, is there a way that you can somehow take out some type of suit to escalate it up to, you know, for example, we just had an election in Wisconsin a couple of days? ago with the Supreme Court. I think the Democrat won in that election. But is there a way that even in a case like this, say that you sued Ridgeland or whatever it was, how does it ever work that you could ever even just get it to the Supreme Court of Wisconsin to hear the case or even on a bigger scale, get it to somehow on a national level as far as a court case goes? How hard is that as attorneys?

I can start in the way and you can chime in. I mean, so there is, you know, the ongoing, as I said, the special prosecutor proceeding. So Ridgelness currently has a criminal investigation going on where district attorney is investigating them and can bring charges. And certainly that's something that could ultimately go all the way to trial. It could go all the way to the court of appeals and then to the Supreme Court of Wisconsin, especially if there's like important or novel legal issues. I mean, my hunch is that probably won't happen. It's pretty unusual for corporations to go all the way to trial. They know how much a jury hates what they do. And so they do, and so they do, everything they can to settle. But that's certainly N Avenue. As for getting like the federal government involved, there's, there are things that the federal government can do. I'm actually a lot less well-versed in this. And so maybe Wayne could say something, but I know that it was the DOJ that got involved against Envigo. And certainly if the federal government, you know, the USDA has jurisdiction. We know that that Ridgeland has been doing all sorts of horrible things to dogs. I'm sure they've been violating plenty of regulations federally. And, you know, it'd be great if the DOJ got involved. Part of the issue there is just that a lot of this is committed to discretion.

So one of the reasons that the district attorney in Dane County, even though his job is to enforce the criminal law, he didn't do anything for years, even though people were asking him to. And he had the power to decide whether or not to bring charges. The same is true for federal prosecutors. The difference, though, is that once you build a movement, once you have people on the ground pressuring, that can change things. Because then suddenly these prosecutors who do have the power to bring charges realize that this is something that matters and then they'll go out of their way to bring the charges. And so that's what we've seen in Dane County where over years people were asking for charges. Those charges were never brought. And as a result, we were able to get this

special prosecutor appointed. And then certainly federally, to the degree that we can pressure the federal government and the U.S. attorneys in Wisconsin to do something, I think that'll also be great. Yeah, I agree with everything Stefan said. The only thing I'll add is at a high level, the fundamental problem of trying to get animals into court is that very often they're seen as things rather than legal persons, right? And this goes back to a paper that my mentor in law school Cass Sunstein wrote like 25 years ago. It's called Standing for Animals. And the idea by legal standing is there are some beings that exist that have the right to bring a court case, the right to be victims in a court case, to be a party to court case, to be visible under the law. And for a long time

in American history, there are a lot of human beings that didn't have standing, right? Women couldn't bring cases in court. Obviously, you know, we have this sort of history of slavery that men at certain classes of, you know, human beings were just considered property and things. And I kid you not, in this case, one of the arguments the prosecution made is that the activists, and I mean the original case that was brought against me when I rescued this poor beagle was blind and spinning a cage, as they said, well, Wayne might have had a right to rescue a person, but these are property. These dogs aren't persons. They're property. And therefore, because they're just things, there's no legal right to give them aid. They don't have.

have any legal recognition of the law. And, and, you know, like, I've said this before, but any four-year-old can recognize that there's a difference between a dog and a thing. I mean, like, that literally is something that developmental psychologists study, that there's a difference that human beings can figure out between animated beings, like living beings and things. And yet, the legal system is in the Stone Ages. And this isn't because the law is incorrect as it's written, because the law actually does a lot to acknowledge the rights of animals and the fact that animals are not just chairs or pieces of garbage or test tubes. But it's a political corruption of the legal system that causes otherwise seemingly intelligent people like the district attorney in Dan County,

Wisconsin, Ismael-Azahn, to ignore the common sense reality that there is a difference between a dog and a piece of garbage, right? Yeah. And that, again, I could send you the exact brief where they said, okay, maybe they had the right to, if there was a person in that case, they'd have the right to help. But this is not a person. This is property. And this has come up in other cases, too. We had a case in Utah where a prosecutor literally compared a dying piglet to a dented can. And it's just, it's mind-blowing how – because it's weird how so many Americans like Rebecca think, like, oh, my God, lawyers, they have all the sophisticated knowledge.

They're really smart. They can figure all this stuff out. And you have a bunch of lawyers saying there's no difference between a dog and a thing. There's no difference in a piglet and a dented can. This is why we need democracy, right? Because if you let the lawyers run the system, sometimes it ends up reaching conclusions that are so absurd that, you know, sometimes all you can do is just laugh. Yeah. That's kind of where we are of animals in a lot of cases.

Wayne, did you actually go to jail over stealing the beagle? No. So this is one of the ones that I've missed jail time. I've been to jail for other cases, sadly. Or, you know, honestly, it hasn't even been that bad. It's worth it for me because it's the only way to get the animal story in court. I'm happy to do it. But in this case, they never even arrested me because I voluntarily appeared.

You know, as Stefan described in our theory of voluntary prosecution, like my view of it is, if the only way we can get courts and juries to deliberate on the legal status of animals and whether animals are things or beings deserving of protection is for a human being to face incarceration, let's go. And would you do it again? Yes. Yeah, I mean, I've done it again. And I will continue to do it until the day I die.

Until every animal is treated like the living being with the rights that they deserve. And they already have. It's just a lot to us to recognize these animals have rights. And again, this is not a right or left issue. I mean, I know there are a lot of issues that have become very polarized. This is just a basic human decency issue. Did you get any videos? Do not stamp a piglet to death.

Don't inject dogs of rabies, kittens with all sorts of paralytics and, you know, inject things in their skull and surgical. mutilate them. And this is like common sense human decency. And if this is the only way to get common sense human decency, let's do it. Wayne, you said you got video that day. Did you ever release any of the video? Yeah, it's on YouTube. Oh, it is. We published it publicly to everyone in the world, every second of video footage, we released anyone who wants to see it. We were completely open and transparent from day one because we believed, and the court ultimately concluded that we have the right to do it. Yeah.

You're torturing a dog. And one of the interesting arguments, I think Stefan was the one who found this argument. And I don't know how I didn't find this, because I've been thinking about this like for 20 years. And I like to think I'm like a reasonably competent lawyer, but I never found this argument. But the argument, I think Stephanie, you know what argument. It's the warrant argument for police. The argument Stefan made is, wait a minute. There is very clear law that shows that law enforcement are entitled to kick your door down and violate all of your constitutional rights if an animal is being hurt.

If law enforcement is allowed to do this in violation of your constitutional right, then why can an ordinary citizen who sees a puppy in a cage or a kitten drowning in a pool, why can't they jump over your fence and help that kitten? And that's all we did. We didn't damage anything. We didn't try to hurt anybody. We didn't try to break any laws. All we were trying to do is help animals we knew were suffering. The government's own inspectors identified them as suffering, engaging in abnormal, psychotic behaviors, suffering from lesions and wounds, having their lives. legs trapped in cage wire.

All these things were happening. Even after the special prosecutor petition, we got additional inspection reports finding these things are happening. And all we were trying to do is help animals in a context where anybody's grandmother would say, helping the animal is clearly the right thing to do. No, I 100% agree with that. I do have a question for all of you because I'm going to ask specifically Wayne and Stefan this question. And then Rebecca also, because you went to school, Rebecca, right, for political science, right?

Okay. Based on all this stuff, do you guys see the government differently? And I don't know exactly how long that you guys have been involved in this, I guess, this movement, this push, this lifestyle, this, you know, you obviously devote a lot of your life to this. But to the two attorneys, first of all, what do you guys specialize in as attorneys? And do you see the government differently based on your, I guess, going down the rabbit holes through. the animal experimentation. Like, how do you view the government? Because obviously, we've had a lot of political discourse over the past four or five years

to where, or eight years, 10 years, pretty much forever. But really the past 10 years, you're either right or left. There is no center. You're either this, far this, or far that. And I think the more we've done this podcast, the more we've realized is like maybe whether we like this person and say, you know, maybe for our interest, we're going to maybe vote this way. But then the more and more and more you research about everything, you start to realize, okay, well, okay, now this person is not doing.

Everybody seems to be corrupt. Like it doesn't really matter what side you're on necessarily. You may have obviously, you know, I missed 20 years ago, right, when you would have Democrats that had, you know, this set of beliefs. You had Republicans that had this set of beliefs. And now it's just so off the rails on both sides in many cases. But how do you guys view the government in whole? because and the reason I ask this is especially Rebecca, you went to school for political science, but how much of Rebecca, even what, we'll start with you, how much of what you learned in college

in political science has either helped you or maybe you've been more awake to what actually the government is now more than ever? Well, it's interesting, right? Because I've worked in government as well and I've participated in it and I've seen what goes on. And I think what I've realized is that the government is just made up of people, right? And I have seen people be incredibly courageous. I have seen the mayor in Richland Center, Wisconsin, stand up for these animals and pass the first in the country ban on dog and cat experimentation, while others were saying, you're going to have this whole industry come and sue Richland Center. And we're going to get ourselves embroiled in lawsuits.

And he said, I don't care. This is important. We're going to do this. And so seeing that type of courage, seeing Senator Habish Seneca stand up and say, commending the judge's decision, having the judge stand up and say, this is, you know, this is felony criminal animal cruelty. There's probable cause of this. We have seen so many people stand up and take action, which has been incredibly inspiring.

And on the other hand, we have, you know, inspectors who maybe they felt like they didn't have the power to do anything and they've just been filing these reports of the horrific cruelty. and putting them in a drawer somewhere where they never see the light of day unless we make FOIA requests for them. And so it's just been this one side or the other where people are either willing to step up and use the levers that they have and stand up for these animals or they just aren't ready yet. And that's been disappointing. So I would say I don't know if there's anything in my background or in my education that is really surprising and contributed to this. But it's definitely our government is made up of humans and we are all fallible. Wayne, what about you?

What do you think? What do you think about the government whole with this whole thing? Because, I mean, you've been arrested like how many times? I mean, you're basically, I don't know. You, uh, has there been any protests for you, Wayne? All for behavior, all for behavior that my grandma and my mom taught me to do as just like a matter of common human decency. You know, you see a dog freezing outside in the Chicago winter. no one's there to help and try and help them.

You know, you see a cat that's starving to death on the street. You give them some food. I mean, these are the things I was taught to do, my grandparents, my grandparents, and for doing that in the context of large industrial power in the United States, I've faced, I don't even know how many felony charges at this point. So the system's broken. I think, and I think Americans are trying to wise up to this. And this is why I think, you know, we've seen some of the recent election results,

because a lot of people do recognize there's something deeply broken in American democracy right now. The civil lining is it's a lot better to know that because then you can do something about it. So, you know, I applaud the work you guys are doing. I looked at some of the podcasts you've done in the past. I think people need to hear these stories. They need to find out about how often these systems are going off the rails because the only way for us to live in a society where we trust the institutions is for the institutions that gave in trustworthy behavior. And right now, too often the institutions are not engaging in trustworthy behavior. And I will say this, it's, again, it's not just about animals because when power can be deployed against vulnerable beings, that structure is broken for all of us, right?

It's broken for the homeless person on the street. It's broken for the fentanyl attic in rural America. It's broken for the literally millions of Californians who cannot afford housing anymore because all we're building is like super fancy housing for the ultra-rich. And we can't build a single apartment for anyone who's like even middle class, upper middle class now. It's broken for everybody. You know, when power is corrupting the political and legal system, this dramatically, it's bad for everybody.

And in many ways, this is a terrible metaphor as an animal actor to use, but I'll use it anyways. In many ways, what happens to the most vulnerable beings, these poor puppies, is just a canary in the coal mine, right for the rest of us. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And Wayne, where did you go to school at? And what is your specialty as far as law goes? Yeah, so I went to the University of Chicago for three degrees.

And then I went to MIT and dropped out because I was a terrible PhD student and couldn't finish. But my main focus in law has been, it's been litigation, both civil and criminal. But the specific expertise I have actually started thinking I was going to represent people here who are basically facing violence by the state unconstitutionally. Like people on death row. I advocated for victims of domestic violence. Also did some civil litigation for big companies just to pay the bills. but by far the most impactful and the most amount of time I've spent

over the last 20 years since I graduated from law school has been defending animals. Like in whatever capacity I can, using whatever tools I have as a lawyer as a human being on this earth, I've been trying to defend these poor creatures from people who are much more powerful of them and who seek to abuse that power and hurt them. Yeah, that's awesome.

We commend you. You don't live in Chicago now, though, do you? You live in California now. I don't. I move to California like a lot of other Well, now, so now you're destined to either move to Austin or Nashville, right? Is that where you're going next? I don't know.

We'll see. And Stefan, what about you? Where did you get to school? What is, what do you think about the government and what is your kind of area of specialty? Yeah, so I went to Yale Law School. And my specialty is criminal law and animal law. I'm a much newer lawyer than Wayne, so he has a lot more experience. But my real focus has been the intersection of criminal law and

animal law. So especially defending activists like Wayne, people who are charged by the state for heroic and courageous acts of rescue or for just blowing the whistle. And I would echo what Rebecca and Wayne said about the government. I mean, I'm always surprised when you are able to talk to someone one-on-one, no matter what their ideology is, no matter what institution they're part of, those conversations in my experience, especially when you engage in good faith, have been extremely productive. Everyone wants to help suffering humans and animals. And if you can reach people on that level, I've always found that to be especially helpful. But I agree with Wayne also that the institutions, a lot of them have become, you know, sort of stuck in their ways.

There's a lot of inertia. They've become blind to maybe effects that they're having. I mean, that's partially why I think in some ways what defines our current politics isn't even so much left or right versus as much as like, you know, skeptical of institutions versus like defending of institutions and like a skepticism in government. And I think that's as a lawyer, one of the things I've seen is the way that law can actually cause a lot of those problems. I mean, Wayne was telling the story of how lawyers, if you spend too much time in the law books, you might say crazy things like a pig lives the same thing as a dented can or a dog as a thing. And I think all too often law is a way of encoding these kinds of things, encoding the human element out of things because it distances things. It makes it much easier if you're just sort of reading words on a page. if you're thinking of terms, you know, in these sort of abstract terms, if you're using too much Latin,

those kinds of things can, I think, dole you from what actually matters from the individuals on the ground. And so I think that's one thing that I've learned is the degree that we can make the government more human, more accessible. That's that I think would be very important. The only other thing I would add, though, is I think there's also just a tendency towards cynicism. I mean, the more you learn about this stuff, and certainly the more that I've, you know, that I dig into these cases, whether it's animal research or before law school, I did a lot of work with people who are in prison, you know, who just, wanted someone to like, you know, to fight for them and felt like the system was just, you know, crushing them and rolling over them and that they'd become nobodies, that they become numbers. You know, it's really easy for that to breed cynicism where you just think, you know, everything's

corrupt, nothing's going to work. But I think in some ways, that sometimes ends up like handing it to those who do have power. Because if we're cynical and we think, oh, everything's corrupt, nothing's going to happen, then whoever has the most money and the most power, they're going to be able to still get the things that they want. And we sort of cede the game to them. And so I think it's important as much as we should be realists about all of these things. It's also important to stay optimistic, to stay confident, and to organize with people to, like, fix the things that we see are broken, and to reclaim the institutions and make them work again, and make them, you know, human and responsive to humans and animals alike. And I think this, I mean, and you make

great points here. And I think that's why so much of our journey has been, you know, it can't be one side or the other. I don't know how we ever come together as a nation without political divide. but the moment that we do, the moment is going to be very bad for the corrupt politicians and government. And that's the moment when the people win. Yeah. And they know that, though. I mean, all the institutions, all the government organizations, the higher ups. I'm not talking about the people because I know there's a lot of great people.

Even, you know, even people that criticized the FBI, whether it was under the Trump term or whatever, there's still so many people that we always talk about that devoted their entire lives to get into the FBI to be an FBI agent. And yet there will be leaders at times that come in and kind of disrupt and destroy that stuff. But I've always said the best way you can ever rule a people is by dividing. And I think that the government in most ways has been very good at that for a long time. And it also makes everything very hard, including the fight like you guys are fighting for the animals, which we're very grateful that you guys are. Because without people like you, you know, no one's ever going to have awareness of this. we're never going to know further details on this.

And I know it's hard for people to listen to. People out there right now are like, you know, I don't want to really listen to. But I hope that people are, I hope that people are going to engage. And so for that reason, I want to ask you guys briefly, where can people help each of you, each of your causes, how can they support, how can they get involved? Rebecca will start with you. Our website is dane4dogs.org. So it's Dane, D-A-M-E, the number four dogs.org.

And if you go to that website, you'll find a list. of actions that you can take, whether it's calling Governor Ivers, the Governor of Wisconsin, whether it's calling DACAP, there's a list of actions that we're asking people to take to help us reach our elected officials, reach our government, and try to raise awareness of this and keep this in the spotlight. So, and then I would also say thank you so much for covering this because we can't do this. Our whole mission is to get this out, right, to shine a light on what's happening and it's media and podcasts like you that help us do that. So thank you. Sure. Wayne. Yeah. So first, I can say how much I'm grateful to you for saying what you just

said. Because I mean, you've already heard like I'm a liberal. I'm a progressive in a lot of ways. But I think if there's one thing our country should be able to unify around, it's that torturing animals is wrong. It's around dogs. Right. So let's do that. So so appreciate you saying that. And, you know, to be honest, like, again, I'm a liberal, but I've had views. Vivek Ramoswamy, Mike Sernovich, Christopher Rufo, supporting some of the stuff we put out there, and I'm happy for it. I think it's great when right-wingers and left-wingers can come together behind the idea that Sengen Bings shouldn't be tortured.

I think the most important thing people can do to help us, including people like Mike Sernovich and people like someone listening in your audience who's a conservative is just educate yourselves. Because, I mean, so much of the stuff we're told about what happens in animals, and that's not just dogs and experiments. This is pigs and factory farms. This is chickens and egg farms, right? Like all this stuff about bird flu.

we're being lied to about this stuff. Straight up lied to by our own government, by corporations. So you need to empower yourself, even for your own benefit, even if you're just a selfish prick who doesn't want to get bird flu or doesn't want to have some weird medical procedure done to you that was tests on animals who were tortured, like educate yourself and make decisions aligned with your values. And I think the more you unpack the cover of this system, the more you're going to see things that happen to vulnerable beings, human beings and animals, that you'll find unconscionable. But specifically, if you're interested in my work, you can go to simpleheart.org. I've got a substack. And by the way, Wayne is a vegetarian, and I have followed a lot of his videos. So if anyone out there is a vegetarian, go follow Wayne because he's awesome. And by the way, being vegetarian is great. I've been doing for 24, what, wait, 20, 25, 26 years?

One of the best decisions in my life. Well, I'm telling you, I became a vegetarian for years and years and years. And the only reason I did was not for the health benefit is because I saw a chicken truck full of these little chicken cages. And I just can't handle that. And then I got pregnant and my doctor was like, you have to have iron. Which is the way's around that as well. Yeah, I know. I was doing iron shots and everything.

But anyways, I'm, you know, I'm. Well, that's awesome. And, you know, if people want to learn about vegetarians, by all means, come to the page. Because you're right, those chicken trucks are awful. 5,000 chickens stuffed onto a truck, shoulder to shoulder, standing in their own excrement. It's an awful life for any sentient being. And no one should treat any animal. Dog, cat, human rat, chicken.

No, no animal should live their life in a cage. That's a young. I think most people agree with that. And Stefan, what about you? Yeah, I'll echo what Rebecca said, especially if you're in Wisconsin, you know, reach out to the governor, reach out to the regulatory agencies there and go to Danefordog's website, which has a lot of that info. Outside of Wisconsin, getting involved in your, you know, in your local community, I mean, the same way that Rebecca said, she found out that this was happening in her backyard.

Unfortunately, these kinds of things are happening in almost everyone's backyard. Whether it's, you know, a research institution like this, if it's, you know, like a factory farm that's mistreating animals, if it's a puppy mill. Before I was here in Denver, I was in Seattle, and I found out that the University of Washington and Seattle, they still have a primate lab where they're doing horrible things to chimpanzees and other, I mean, it's just horrible what they're doing. And just getting involved, even if there's just like a handful of you or if it's just you by yourself, like it's hard to understate the kind of impact you can have on other people. The last thing I'll say is I'll just give a plug. We've talked about the chicken trucks.

Our project actually has a trial this summer of an individual who rescued chickens who are also in a horrible state, got them immediately to a veterinarian who were, you know, headed to a slaughterhouse. And now the state, instead of going after the company that mistreated these chickens, is going after this courageous rescuer. And so to the degree that we can get people, you know, learning about that case, learning about what's going on and learning about just sort of the way the law goes after rescuers, I think that is enormously valuable. Her name is Zoe Rosenberg. The case is going to be in Sonoma County, California, where she did this courageous rescue. So, yeah, that's another thing to follow. Awesome.

Yeah, Zoe's a hero. It's always incredible. Definitely follow that trial in that case. It's pretty wild what they're doing. Well, guys, I would love to bring you guys back on another podcast where we get into politics. I'm just kidding. I'm just, no, no, honestly, I would love to get to talk to you guys about some law stuff and just some, you know, crazy. Because I think you guys are very approachable.

I think that you have your head on your shoulders. And I think that we need to do more of, you know, reaching across the lines. Bipartisan. Yeah, the bipartisan stuff. We have to do more of that no matter what someone's opinion is on whatever. Yeah. And that's what I said. I don't care who they are, what they believe in.

They believe in taking care of animals and saving the animals. And I want them on the podcast. And they're coming on. So that's all I can. Absolutely, man. We are so grateful for you guys that came on. And by the way, guys, if you do want to stick around just until the end of the song, just to say bye, that's fine.

If not, we can email you either way. But that's going to be it for this episode of Investigator, Earth podcast. We are very, very grateful for all of Rebecca and Wayne and Stefan, of course, they're doing very courageous work out there. And we are very appreciative of that. And we need to help them, guys. We got to do it. We got to do our part to help these people make a difference in this world. Absolutely. And that's essentially why we started this podcast seven years ago was because we felt like the government was corrupt. And there was a lot of corruption in the world. And we had to do something about it. That's why we started this. And more of

you hopefully will take initiative as well. But until next time, guys, we love you. Peace out. Peace out, guys. Get me up, so in a new, so we reach out, reach out, reach our, please. I find my way. I found my way. I was in the dark against it all, but made to do the day, because I find my way.

I find my way. In bad times, I know I'll be okay. Because I find my way. Because I find my way. I find my way. I was in the dark, I kissed it all, I made it do the thing, because I find my way, I find my way. In bad times, I know I'll be okay, because I find my way.