Trump administration launches multi-agency strike force to crack down on animal abuse

The Trump administration on Saturday announced the formation of a cross-agency strike force to crack down on animal cruelty, coordinating action across the Justice Department, the Agriculture Department and the Health and Human Services Department to target dogfighting, puppy mills and animal testing.

Attorney General Pam Bondi said the plan would establish designated U.S. attorneys in every state to prosecute animal-abuse cases and would include specialized training for prosecutors and law enforcement on executing search warrants in animal-cruelty investigations. Bondi appeared with Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to discuss the interagency initiative on Fox News. "We are forming a strike force... and we're going to have designated U.S. attorneys in every state to prosecute these [animal abuse] cases," Bondi said. She noted the seizure of 190 dogs from a single defendant, LeShon Johnson, declaring that the case shows that "no one is above the law" when it comes to animal cruelty.

Rollins said the USDA is taking a tougher approach to shutting down abusive puppy mills, moving away from warnings toward stricter enforcement of the Animal Welfare Act. She cited that compliance with the act had hovered around the mid-60s percent in earlier years and is now closer to 92 percent, but emphasized that the 8 percent noncompliant cases would be targeted. "No more puppy mills where you have puppies stacked on top of each other, where, if you don't sell them, then you drown them in a barrel because it's the cheapest way to do it," Rollins said. She described the conditions in mass-breeding operations and said the administration would pursue shut-downs and stronger penalties.

In a separate briefing, Kennedy said all the major sub-agency heads at HHS are deeply committed to ending animal experimentation. He noted that recent studies show that the predictivity of animal models is poor for human health outcomes and that more efficient methods, including computational modeling and artificial intelligence, can provide better early health predictions. He cited that there are roughly 100,000 primates in U.S. research labs and about 20,000 imported each year, and said the department plans to reduce those numbers and to "re-educate researchers" to use modern approaches. He also referenced a change in NIH policy in September allowing funding to retire primates to sanctuaries after experimentation rather than euthanizing them, calling it a step toward better welfare standards.

Kennedy framed animal welfare as a measure of the country’s character, stating that "the badge of a really humane nation is the way that it takes care of its animals." He and other officials described the strike force as a nationwide effort to coordinate enforcement of the Animal Welfare Act and to expand the use of humane, non-animal research methods. The initiative, they said, will rely on training for prosecutors and tighter interagency collaboration to pursue cases involving dogfighting, puppy mills and controversial testing practices.

The administration characterizes the package as a long-term, interagency effort designed to raise standards for animal care and to shift toward scientifically validated alternatives in research, while underscoring the moral and legal expectations surrounding animal welfare in the United States.