PETA steals the Olympics dressage show. Now what about rodeo?

PETA video embarrasses three top riders in just three days,  but only SHARK appears to have cameras watching rodeo & charreada

PARIS,  France;  PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania––As equestrian events get underway at the 2024 summer Olympic Games in Paris,  France,  People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has already stolen the show.

Allegations of abuse against three-time Olympic dressage champion Charlotte Dujardin of the United Kingdom forced her out of the competition.  Austrian show jumping contender Max Kuehner and Brazilian dressage champion Carlos Parro are also having to do some explaining.

PETA did picket the Twisters premier

The PETA performance at the Olympics has some observers and critics wondering why PETA has not campaigned as vigorously against the much more conspicuous abuse of horses and cattle in rodeo and charreada here at home,  notwithstanding that PETA did also steal the show with an anti-rodeo protest at the July 12,  2024 Los Angeles premier of Twisters,  sequel to the 1996 hit Twister.

At least a decade has elapsed since any national organization other than Showing Animals Respect & Kindness has conducted an active video campaign against either rodeo or charreada,  also called “Mexican rodeo.”

Max Kuener to be “hauled before a judge”

Kuehner “will be hauled before a judge in Germany after allegedly hitting his animal with a bar,”  revealed news reporter Summer Raemason of The Sun,  a London-based British tabloid,  on July 25,  2024,  just ahead of the Olympics opening ceremonies on the Seine River in Paris.

“The pro equestrian,  ranked number three in the world,”  Raemason wrote,  “is claimed to have struck the horse’s legs to make him jump higher.

“He was set to compete in Versailles,”  a Paris suburb,  “in the individual and team jumping competitions before the accusations came to light.

“Kuehner,  50,  was accused by the Munich II public prosecutor’s office of violating the German Animal Welfare Act by engaging in ‘active bar jumping’ or ‘barring,’”  Raemason explained,  “in which a horse’s legs are whacked with a pole when the horse goes over jumps, has been dubbed ‘rapping’––and was outlawed in Germany last year.

Can Kuener beat the rap?

“After obtaining information from a whistleblower,”  Raemason said,  “PETA filed a criminal complaint against Kuehner with the Munich II public prosecutor’s office last September.  Penal orders against Kuehner and a second person working as a trainer were issued in March this year.

“The practice,  which is alleged to have taken place at Kuhner’s training stable in Starnberg, Germany,”  Raemason added,  “is banned by the International Federation for Equestrian Sports.”

Kuehner is vigorously defended by Elisabeth Max-Theurer,  five-time president of the Austrian Equestrian Federation and vice president of the Austrian Olympic Committee.

Dujardin withdrew before she got booted

Dujardin withdrew from the Paris Olympics one day before media received video of her allegedly whipping a horse 24 times at a training stable, with an unidentified rider on the horse.

Dujardin was provisionally banned for six months from international dressage competition.

“The video of Team Great Britain equestrian star Charlotte Dujardin whipping a horse in a private coaching session has cost her a damehood,  official sources have told the Guardian,”  wrote correspondent Sean Ingle from Paris.

Dropped by the Brooke

“The 39-year-old was widely expected to be handed the honor,”  Ingle reported,  “if,  as expected,  she won another dressage medal in Paris.  That would have equaled (former track bicyclist) Jason Kenny’s record tally (of seven medals) for a British Olympian.

“To compound her problems,”  Ingle added,  “UK Sport has also suspended her lottery funding after the video of her hitting the horse became public.

“Dujardin has also been dropped as an ambassador for the horse welfare charity,  Brooke,”  formerly known as the Brooke Hospital for Animals,  “which said it had been ‘deeply disturbed’ by the video of her repeatedly striking the horse while conducting a coaching session for a young rider at a private stables several years ago.”

Carlos Parro

“The scandal engulfing dressage at the Olympics continued,”  Luke Baker of The Independent reported on July 27,  2024,   “as Brazilian rider Carlos Parro was issued a warning by the equestrian governing body for potentially causing “unnecessary discomfort” to his horse Safira.

“The Federation for Equestrian Sports (FEI) received a letter and photos that were sent to its president,  Ingmar De Vos,  from animal rights group PETA accusing Parro of mistreatment.

“One photo shows Parro hyper-flexing Safira’s neck in a prohibited movement called Rollkur – whereby the horse’s breathing is compromised – and the FEI responded 24 hours later by warning Parro about his conduct,”  said Baker.

For a detailed explanation of what Parro allegedly did,  see Hyperflexion: Going to Extremes.

“Remove equestrian events from the Olympics”

“The message to the International Olympic Committee should be clear by now:  remove equestrian events from the Olympic Games,”  argued PETA senior vice president Kathy Guillermo.

PETA has campaigned at least since 2008 to have equestrian events,  included in the Olympics since 1900,   dropped from the games.

Olympic equestrian events include,  besides dressage and show jumping,  three-day eventing and modern pentathlon.

“Modern pentathlon has already decided to scrap the equestrian element of the sport at the 2028 Los Angeles Games,”  recalled Ingle,  “after it was heavily criticized (during the 2020 Olympics) in Tokyo,  following an incident where a German coach punched a horse after the horse refused to jump the obstacles.”

Three animals dead at Calgary Stampede

Meanwhile,  apart from a single 92-word statement posted to the PETA website deploring the deaths of a steer in a steer-wrestling event and two horses in the chuckwagon races,  PETA was quiet about the 2024 Calgary Stampede rodeo,  held from July 5 through July 15.

At least 73 horses have been killed as result of chuckwagon racing accidents at the Calgary Stampede since 1986,  according to Vancouver Humane Society data.

Stealth bill kills 1990 Pittsburgh rodeo ban

Apart from a joint media release issued by Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy,  national animal advocacy groups have also so far been silent about a stealth pre-emption and repeal of a Pittsburgh,  Pennsylvania rodeo ban won in 1990 by longtime humane officer Ed Blotzer.

(See Remembering Ed Blotzer, 1924-2002.)

“Under a little-noticed provision in the new state budget,”  reported Stephen Caruso of Spotlight PA on July 18,  2024,  “Pennsylvania municipalities will be forced to allow rodeo events to take place in their borders even if local lawmakers have voted to restrict them.”

Pittsburgh is the only Pennsylvania municipality that has such an ordinance.

How it happened

“The language is tucked into the nearly 140-page fiscal code,”  explained Caruso,  “an omnibus piece of legislation that authorizes the state to spend money.  The code passed with wide bipartisan support and was signed by Democratic governor Josh Shapiro in mid-July.

“No elected official approached by Spotlight PA was willing to speak on the record about the measure,  and none took credit for its inclusion,”  Caruso found.  “ Because of how it passed, no one had to put their name to it.

“Code bills are typically negotiated in secret by top leaders and unveiled shortly before lawmakers begin voting,”  Caruso continued.  “This secrecy and speed make code bills an easy way for lawmakers to enact controversial policies that have nothing to do with the budget with little public notice.”

So what did the code bill do?

“The new budget,”  Caruso said,  “allows certain rodeo-hosting companies to pick up to 12 days per calendar year to host a ‘ticketed,  public’ rodeo or ‘rodeo-related event.’  During those 12 days,  any local rodeo regulations ‘shall not apply.’”

This new law pertains,  Caruso noted,  “only to rodeos hosted by entities that operate in at least 10 states each year and in venues with capacities of at least 2,500,”  in other words only to Professional Bull Riders,”  described by Caruso as “a Colorado-based organization that oversees hundreds of bull-riding competitions across the U.S. and internationally.”

Caruso attributed the passage of the code bill benefitting Professional Bull Riders to the work of Allegheny Strategy Partners,  a lobbying firm whose partners include “Joe Scarnati,  the onetime president of the state Senate.  Professional Bull Riders paid the firm more than $22,000 to bend legislators’ ears between May 2023,”  Caruso said,  “when it registered to lobby,  and March 2024,  according to Pennsylvania Department of State records.”

“This turnaround must be stopped!!!”

“This turnaround must be stopped!!! and a message given that this kind of activity — obliterating current regulations and laws–by the rodeo industry and politicians–will not succeed,”  emailed longtime New York City animal advocate Irene Muschel to ANIMALS 24-7.  Muschel in 2020 unsuccessfully promoted a bill to ban rodeo in New York state.

(See What happened when I tried to ban rodeo in New York?)

“Other than telling its New York members to ‘Contact your legislators,’  PETA did nothing to help these members support the New York bill to stop rodeos,”  Muschel remembered.

“Round & round in a closed circle”

“PETA has helped move other bills covering other forms of cruelty to animals by providing letters for people to click on–always the easiest and most effective way to engage large numbers of members who care,  but want a quick remedy.  Letters to legislators exert pressure.  But PETA has not done this for rodeo animals,”  Muschel wrote.

“It is difficult to understand the rationale for this very limited activism by an organization that does in fact completely understand what rodeos are about,”  Muschel told ANIMALS 24-7.

“In addition,  legislators do not read PETA’s website and legislators,”  in New York,  Pennsylvania,  and other states without a historical presence of rodeo,  “know nothing about what rodeos do.

“The people who read PETA’s website share PETA”s values about caring for animals––and they would never go to a rodeo anyway.  So it is hard to see where all this goes other than round and round in a closed circle,”  Muschel said.

Bob Baffert reinstated

Meanwhile,  though both PETA and the Humane Society of the U.S. campaigned for the suspension of horse racing trainer Bob Baffert by regulatory agencies after the May 2023 death of the thoroughbred Havnameltdown at the Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore.

Said PETA senior vice president Kathy Guillermo then,  “Baffert has been implicated in drugging scandals and the deaths of seven horses who collapsed in California,  and at least 75 horses in his care have died.

“The tragic death of Havnameltdown is the latest in a long line of fatalities.  The racing industry must kick out the bad guys or it will have blood on its hands as well as blood on its tracks.”

Signifying monkeys watch the races

Churchill Downs Incorporated,  host of the annual Kentucky Derby,   had already suspended Baffert from racing horses at Churchill Downs and partner tracks in 2022,  after the Baffert-trained horse Medina Spirit,  who originally finished first in the 2021 Kentucky Derby,  was disqualified for failing a post-race drug test.

Baffert fought the test findings and the suspension in court,  losing in February 2023.  Meanwhile Baffert was also banned for a year from Pimlico,  the site of the Preakness,  and Belmont Park,  home of the Belmont Stakes.

Despite all that,  ANIMALS 24-7 is unaware,  as of July 27,  2024,  of any national animal advocacy organization saying anything about Churchill Downs Incorporated rescinding Baffert’s suspension on July 19,  2024.

Confession

Reported The Athletic,  “Churchill Downs’ decision to rescind the suspension followed Baffert taking responsibility for Medina Spirit’s failed drug test.”

Acknowledged Baffert in a prepared statement,  “I am responsible for any substance found in the horses that I train, and I have paid a very steep price with a three-year suspension and the disqualification of Medina Spirit’s performance.  I understand and appreciate that Churchill Downs and the Kentucky Derby Horse Racing Commission took steps to enforce the rules that they believed were necessary to protect the safety and integrity of horse racing and the reputation of the Kentucky Derby.”

Kitty can’t make up her mind

Unlike Guillermo and PETA,  who are not known to have ever said anything good about Baffert,  Humane Society of the U.S. president Kitty Block ripped Baffert in 2018 for allegedly drugging Triple Crown winner Justify,  praised Baffert in 2020 for supporting passage of the Horseracing Integrity Act,  and has again criticized him since then.

(See The baffling case of horse trainer Bob Baffert.)

Since the Anti-Doping & Medication Control program created by the Horseracing Integrity & Safety Act (HISA) took effect on May 22,  2023,  according to the Horseracing & Safety Authority,  also created by HISA,  racehorse fatalities per 1,000 starts have dropped 36%,  from 1.18 to 0.76.

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