Katy Senator tries to legalize horse slaughtering

The 80th Texas Legislature is proving to be one of the zaniest yet. This week, Senator Glenn Hegar, a Republican from Katy, amended a bill to allow for legalized horse slaughtering in Texas. The bill, SB 911 (ha ha), along with Hegar's amendment, would allow the sale of horsemeat for human consumption, if the animals are tested by the commission. But isn't that illegal in Texas? Well, Hegar has only the most humane interests.

He argued that "right now, tragically, animals are just left out in the field or they're shipped off to Mexico," where the inhumane treatment is "probably pretty severe." Hegar would rather just slaughter horses here, where we can feel good about what we're doing because it's in our control.

Skip Trimble of the Texas Humane Legislation Network saw things a little differently. Trimble noted that the Department of Agriculture indicates no correlation between reduction in horse slaughter here and the exportation of animals to other countries for slaughter. He called the amendment "an obvious attempt to legalize horse slaughter in Texas without going through the normal channels that legislation goes through."

Right now, the bill is out of committee, with the amendment, but Trimble and his organization are confident that it will be killed by animal rights advocates in the House.