In Victory for Animals and Their Defenders, Judge Strikes Down Idaho 'Ag-Gag' Law

In a victory for animal rights advocates—and the animals on factory farms they seek to protect—a federal judge on Monday ruled Idaho’s controversial “ag-gag” law unconstitutional in a decision that said criminalizing the undercover documentation of livestock abuse violates both free speech and the equal protection clause.

“The facts show the state’s purpose in enacting the statute was to protect industrial animal agriculture by silencing its critics.” —U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill

“The effect of the statute will be to suppress speech by undercover investigators and whistleblowers concerning topics of great public importance: the safety of the public food supply, the safety of agricultural workers, the treatment and health of farm animals, and the impact of business activities on the environment,” U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill stated in his 28-page ruling.

Under the law, people filming agricultural operations without permission in Idaho face up to a year in jail and a $5,000 fine. By comparison, a jail sentence for an animal cruelty conviction is capped at six months and a maximum fine of $5,000.

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However, as Winmill’s ruling continued, the legal arguments in favor of banning undercover investigations—long a tactic of animal rights groups with no other way to prove or expose such abuse—did not stand up to scrutiny. “Audio and visual evidence is a uniquely persuasive means of conveying a message,” he wrote, “and it can vindicate an undercover investigator or whistleblower who is otherwise disbelieved or ignored. Prohibiting undercover investigators or whistleblowers from recording an agricultural facility’s operations inevitably suppresses a key type of speech because it limits the information that might later be published or broadcast.”

In the end, the judge concluded, “the facts show the state’s purpose in enacting the statute was to protect industrial animal agriculture by silencing its critics.”

Though other states have passed similar laws in recent years, the decision by Winmill marks the first time a federal court has struck down such legislation. And though the Idaho ruling could be appealed to a higher federal court, it is also likely to spur additional challenges in those other states.

Instigated by an undercover operation by the animal rights group Mercy for Animals, Idaho’s law was signed into law in 2014 by the state’s Republican Gov. Butch Otter, but was challenged in court by a coalition of welfare advocates, led by attorneys with the Animal Legal Defense Fund.