UnchainedTV: Arrested on Capitol Hill Speaking Up for Animals!

0:00 TV journalist and the founder of the Unchained TV free streaming network, Jane Velez Mitchell. You're about to hear a secret solution to the problems that plague our world. If you want to revolutionise your health, get truly joyful and jump to the next phase of human evolution, all it takes is one simple choice. Now, here's your host, Jane Velez Mitchell. Wow, you are going to hear all about this wild congressional hearing where there were arrests and boy, was it dramatic. Really, really, really dramatic fireworks in the form of confrontation and arrests as Congress battles it out over the farm bill.

0:45 We will talk live with one of the animal activists dragged out of a house committee hearing on agriculture recently, while loudly begging lawmakers to stop subsidising the meat and dairy industry that is causing so much harm. A huge contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution, ocean dead zones, preventable lifestyle diseases, healthcare costs, the federal deficit and animal agriculture on a massive unprecedented scale never before seen in history. Unchained TV is all over this story. And we're going to talk to this gentleman, Robert Grillo, the head of Free From Harm, before we play the sound of you talking truth to power.

1:32 Tell us, why did you do this, Robert? Hi, Jane, it's great to be with you on the show. So our mission is to advance a plant -based slaughter-free food system through bold and innovative grassroots action. And that means getting in front of the power holders, the people that are really making the big decisions on the farm bill, which will determine the course of the bailout for the agriculture industry for the next five or six years to come. So it's an incredibly consequential story and process to be involved in.

2:17 Well, I want to play you speaking truth to power as you put it. And let me tell you people, for those who think, oh, it's no big whoop, you know, they get in there. No, it's gotta be terrifying. And I want to talk to you about that. You're putting yourself on the line. But first I want to play the clip of you at a very recent hearing, speaking truth to power. This is a congressional hearing about the farm bill, which as you said, is going to determine basically the future of our food system for the next few years. We are paying billions of dollars to bail out the chicken and egg industry, a $276 billion industry.

3:05 Why are hardworking Americans paid to bail out this industry? It is absurd and immoral. You have betrayed hardworking constituents in America. It's time for a plant-based sustainment for the future. The committee will be in order. The committee will be in order. The committee will stand in resets until the police can restore order. So we invite, by the way, anybody connected to the animal agriculture industry or the farm bill, anybody at all who wants to speak about this issue, you are invited on Unchained TV.

3:48 What was that like? How did you get in there? And tell us about the experience. Well, it was one of the most harrowing, exhaustive things that we've done. And there's so many unpredictable factors. So for example, when we got there, the hearing started at 11 a.m. When we got there at nine, there was a line out the hearing door all the way down the hall. There must've been at least 100 people in line. And we thought to ourselves, okay, we're not gonna get in because we don't know how big this hearing room is. We don't know how fast this line's gonna move. We waited hours.

4:30 We waited three hours. And then we finally, I said to our group, I said, listen, if we are going to get into that hearing room, we are going to have to get in front of the line. We are going to have to wait for an opportunity for that guard person at the door to be distracted and go in. And that's exactly what happened. In a split second, this young man was distracted and five of us slipped in and found a place to stand. Once we got inside, we had to wait another couple of hours on our feet because there were no chairs. And mind you, this is a public hearing. There are supposed to be seats for the public. And when you go into this room, there's only 60 seats.

5:12 And most of them are reserved for lobbyists and journalists, which we're glad to have journalists there. But the lobbyists and the other insiders who take up these seats do not allow any room for the public. So the person like me who comes in to try to get involved, the attitude there is, who are you? What do you think you're doing here? You don't belong here. There's no chairs for you here. You can't stand. You have to find a seat. And if you can't find a seat, you have to go. So we were harassed, harassed, harassed. Finally, hearing came back from recess. G.T. Thompson, the one who banged the gavel down on us, he started the hearing and that's when we did our disruptions.

5:57 There were three of us that disrupted the process. When the gavel goes down, the Capitol Police can arrest you or they can give you a warning and say, you have to leave or you will be arrested. In this case, they immediately arrested us. So there you are. And there's one of the other, that's one of the women who was arrested. And do you feel like your message got through? I mean, that man you're looking at, he's proposing wording in the Farm Bill that would undo Prop 12, Proposition 12, which was passed by the voters of California to prevent meat from tortured pigs from being sold in California.

6:41 We'll tell you more about that in a second, but he's trying to stick in wording there that would completely erase basically all of the propositions that I personally have collected signatures for and take us back to an era where states cannot do any kind of proposition or legislation that's gonna interfere with interstate commerce. I'm gonna tell you that the Humane League, I attended just yesterday, an entire forum run by the Humane League to get people to get mobilised. And you can go to this website, action .thehumaneleague.org forward slash Farm Bill.

7:24 And you can get a whole bunch of action points so that you can call your members of Congress. Yesterday, I called my member of Congress. I also called the two US senators and said, do not allow that wording into the Farm Bill because right now the House and the Senate are in their respective processes trying to figure out what this Farm Bill is gonna look like or if they're even gonna get a Farm Bill done before the end of the year. But do you feel that any of the people in the room, the power brokers heard you, really heard you? So to answer that question, you kind of have to understand first, what is our objective going into this?

8:06 What we're engaged in is what they call changing the weather activism. We are not policy experts. We are not looking for granular language changes to the Farm Bill that will satisfy us. We are looking to get a message out about a transition to a plant-based slaughter -free food system that we feel is urgently needed in the future. And if we wanna see that in the future, we have to start demanding it now. And we need to get that message into the discourse. So we insert ourself into the negotiations because Jane, it's the only way you can be heard.

8:47 Sure, there are organisations like HSUS that have lobbyists and attorneys that can get inside and get meetings with some of these power holders in Congress. However, they're only gonna be asking for modest changes. And the issue I have with, so for example, the issue I have with the EATS Act is that it's really a symptom of a much broader underlying problem. And that is money in politics. Because if we didn't have a system where the meat, dairy and egg industry could pour hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars into the election campaigns of these congressional committee members that are shaping the Farm Bill, we would not have anything like the EATS Act.

9:42 There would be no momentum for industry-led moves like the EATS Act. All it does- Yeah, I hear you. And I think we can sort of agree a little bit to disagree, which is okay. By the way, people, it's okay for us to have a discourse, argument and counter argument to reach a higher understanding of the given subject matter. But we have to remember our commonalities because I'll tell you the other side is organised. They have a very, very organised campaign that they are waging against the plant-based movement. Just last week, I interviewed Robbie Lockey, who has just started a new organisation called the Freedom Food Alliance.

10:28 And as part of that, he issued a more than 100 page report about the organised campaign by the meat and dairy industry to take down the plant-based movement. So I urge everybody. Yes, of course. For example, Robert Grillo and I are not gonna see exactly eye to eye on every single nuance of this issue, but we are united in our effort to stop the torture and killing of 80 plus billion sentient beings, largely for food every year on this planet, which is unprecedented in history. Let me go to the phone lines because they're coming in. Nilo Farr in Dallas, Texas. Your question or thought for Robert Grillo of Free From Harm.

11:09 Hi, thanks to Free From Harm for 15 years of abolitionist animal rights work since inception in 2009. It takes a lot of courage and confidence to do a speak out at the Capitol Hill. You spoke for us. As taxpayers, we don't want our tax dollars to fuel the industrial complex of confined, rape, torture, and kill. On the cusp of this bold direct action of you and your team, what can we do from outside of Washington, D.C. to support this strategy, Pat?

11:53 Good question. What can people do to support you? So we have a series of workshops where we're training people to confront their own congressional reps. Because listen, everyone's gonna have to eventually vote on this farm bill. So we should be priming our congressional reps now and demanding that they vote against any continued bailout of this animal agriculture industry. No more bailout money for factory farming. We want money invested in a plant-based, slaughter-free food system.

12:34 And we can cite the Environmental Working Group's recent report that shows this incredible disparity. That subsidies to animal agriculture since 1994 are $59 billion versus, in comparison with, investments in plant-based proteins. Only $121 million, according to this Environmental Working Group report. We need to tell our congressional reps that this is completely unacceptable. And we demand that they only support a farm bill that transitions us in the right direction.

13:16 And if they don't wanna listen to our calls and emails, we must, I can't emphasise this enough, we must find ways to get in front of them. We must go to their town halls. We must go to their offices. We must go to their fundraisers, wherever we can find them to get face-to-face with them and with dignity, in creative ways, deliver that message. Because otherwise, we will be missing an action. And I hate to say it, but our movement is largely missing an action on this issue. Yeah, I would agree. Paige in Los Angeles, your question or thought for Robert Grillo of Free From Harm?

13:59 Yeah, thank you so much. So I'm also doing some reading here about the bird flu problem. I see that you've spoken a little bit about this today too. Apparently it's getting worse. It's spreading 42 cattle herds, et cetera. And the government's answer, quote, is to bail out industrial chicken farming, allowing them to kill their infected chickens. Start over with a new batch and pay them for their losses. I don't know anyone, I cannot think of anyone, I just can't, that would want to spend our tax dollars, like my own tax dollars, going towards this.

14:44 So how do we get this to the public since we are supposedly the ones that have voting power, which are tax dollars? How does this info, just the general public, hey, do you realise this is where your money's going? Because when I went vegan, there was so much I didn't know, right? The veil's lifted, you hear this from so many vegans. What, my money's going to that? What are your thoughts? So yeah, I think that the way we get popular support for what I agree is absolutely an issue that almost everybody you talk to across the political spectrum agrees that hardworking Americans should not be paying for the problems that the industry creates, that animal agriculture creates these horrendous conditions for animals, and therefore there's these disease outbreaks, and the need to exterminate and dump and get rid of millions of diseased animals.

15:45 That's not the consumer's problems, that's the industry's problem, and yet they have successfully lobbied Congress to get us to pay for this issue. The way we change the shift of power on this is by getting the message out, and the way we get the message out, because the media doesn't care about a lot of stuff, the only way the media cares is if you do something bold and dramatic and creative, and then they say, yes, we have to cover this, and then it gets into their networks and the public sees it, and we build more popular support that way.

16:26 That's the way that we're choosing and trying to build that popular support that we need. Yeah, and bold, brave actions are needed, like you're saying. So what kind of actions can we take? Well, so find out, get to know who your congressional reps are, find out what their schedules are like, find out what events they're having or where they're gonna appear. For example, in Chicago, we think that someone very prominent on a committee on agriculture or the Senate committee is going to be at the pride parade.

17:10 Well, guess what? We're gonna be prepared to confront that person and demand that they vote no, that they vote against any measures to continue the bailout of animal agriculture and to have pride in plants, be plant proud. If the message is about pride, then be plant proud and don't support animal eggs. So look for these opportunities where you can, because it's up to Congress. Congress will eventually vote on all of this money, our money that will be used. So we have to get in front of congressional people and we have to find out where they are and how we can access them because they can ignore our emails and phone calls, right?

17:57 Jane, you're muted. Jane, we don't hear you. Bradley in Arlington, Virginia. Your question or thought? Hi, I apologise. It's Arlington, Texas. And we're here like in the heart of meat eating industry. I'm a cultural historian who's been a conscientious food consumer my whole life. I've defined myself as a vegan before, as a vegetarian before, all these other things. And I'm definitely for the cause and commend everybody's work. But my question, I think, kind of like stems from my experience early on trying to be an activist, observing activism in the vegan movement.

18:47 And one of the things I noticed is that oftentimes people look at us like we're crazy, like we're just wild, we're overextreme and we're wanting these absurd ideas, which for a lot of these people seems to be absurd because food and culture are so intricately intertwined, right? Identity and food is so intertwined. And so I wonder what your thoughts are to someone who may say, look, these crazy radicals over here talking about things, going to the extreme, do observing our activism move these people further away?

19:36 That's a good question. I'm gonna jump in with, give him an opportunity to respond. Does what some people might consider extreme activism like disrupting a congressional hearing move people away? Thank you, sir. No, not at all. It doesn't, it wakes people up. Listen, we have to be very careful as activists or anyone to not be gaslighted by the powers that be. And of course, that's the easiest and lowest blow that they can try to deal to us is to gaslight us, to make us think we're crazy when we have actually a very common sense demand, which is, listen, we don't agree with this industry.

20:20 We don't like what they do. We're against it. We would like to see animal agriculture end. However, until that time, the very least we want is not to use our hardworking money, tax dollars, to bail this industry out when it's record, some of the parts of the industry, like the chicken industries, are experiencing record profits. They don't need our money. This is a common sense demand that like Jane and I said earlier, across the political spectrum from left to right, people think, yeah, why should we be paying for an industry that's profiting? It just makes no sense. All right, we've got still more people.

21:02 This has hit a nerve. So we're gonna run through these calls real quick because I wanna get to some other videos. Sam in Pasadena, your question or thought? Hi, hi, Jane. Hi, Robert. Thank you for your bold action in Washington, D.C. It was a really badass disruption. Thank you so much for holding these lawmakers and legislators accountable and calling them out publicly. I think it's really important for us animal rights activists to get involved politically. Disruptions are an excellent way to get our representatives' attention and also the media's attention. Could you recommend an advice to us activists, other methods to act politically? Where to start and how to get involved to help the animals?

21:44 Thank you. Go for it. Listen, join our workshops because every month we have a public workshop where we talk about just all of this, all these different ways that we can become active and we brainstorm and we try to help people find their role and organise their efforts around this idea of what's the worst thing that what's the most heinous part of the bailout? Almost everyone thinks that, and everyone's very uncomfortable with this idea that we're paying to get rid of millions of diseased animals, not just vegans.

22:24 I'm talking about the public at large, that we're actually paying 100% to bail out the industry to get rid of diseased animals and then pay for the hatchery to replace millions of chicks at our expense. This is a boon for the hatchery industry. It's actually making the industry more profitable. So we need to, like I said, I know I sound like a broken record, but we really need, if we're gonna do farm bill activism from the outside, from the grassroots, right? We need to find opportunities to get in front of our congressional reps, to show them that we will get a face-to-face with them, whether they agree to a meeting or not.

23:11 If they wanna have a civil closed door meeting, brilliant, beautiful, we're happy, we're there. But if they ignore us, we will find them at their town halls. We will find them at their fundraisers. We will find them at the people that they have time for, which are the rich and wealthy. They have time to go to their parties. And I've seen the lavish parties in DC. And believe me, those are on our radar, right? Because we wanna get into these parties. We want to bust open this cosy relationship between the meat, dairy and egg industry elites and our Congress people that they are trying to buy outright. All right, let's go to our next caller.

23:52 We're gonna move these along. Quick question, Tiffany in Los Angeles, your question or thought. And then after that, we're gonna head to Steve in Dallas, Texas. Go for it. Thank you, Jane. And thank you, Robert, for all that you do. And I had the pleasure of joining one of your disruptions about a month ago in West LA. And I learned so much from the organisers. And I was just reading DXC founder Wayne, whose song's recent newsletter. And he was writing about how he believes mass change will, the most that we can do for mass change is willing to get arrested. When people see mass people getting arrested.

24:32 So I was just wondering what your thoughts are about that. Yeah, and I'll just say that the arrests that we experienced was a minor inconvenience compared to the day long gruelling wait, the five hour wait on our feet with nowhere to sit in the Longworth building, waiting for this hearing, waiting to get into this hearing. That was the hard part was all the anxiety, the unknowns that, whether we were even gonna get into this hearing room. Once we were arrested, it was a couple of hours of being detained and waiting for the police report to be written and paying a $35 fine and getting released.

25:13 It was really a minor inconvenience, I would call it. Now what Wayne has- We don't have to go to court. We don't have to. We could have chosen a court date if we wanted to, but we decided to just wait, forfeit it and pay the $35 fine because I don't live in DC. So for me, it made sense, right? And for the others too. But so what Wayne is facing is a very different set of circumstances, right? I mean, he and his activist team, they've faced felony charges and the prospect of many years in jail. So I certainly want to contextualise that, right?

25:56 Because the risk we took was minor in comparison to going into a farm, doing open rescue and facing charges like some of the DXC folks have faced. Okay, we're gonna go to another caller. Let's jump to Steve in Dallas, Texas. Your question or thought for our amazing activists today, Robert Grillo from Free From Harm. Yes, wanted to say thank you so much for bringing awareness to this issue. The farm bill has such huge impact on animal lives and a lot of people aren't tuned into it.

26:41 So thank you so much for raising awareness about it and helping organise us. I also wanted to mention, thank you for doing what you did to raise awareness to this. I wanted to just comment a little bit on the previous caller, he mentioned disruptions. Disruptions have been very effective right here in Texas. I'm from the Dallas area. Activists here in Texas have had success doing direct action against circuses, fur stores, puppy mills, foie gras restaurants. We have had success just here from what I have witnessed. It does work. Movement, strike in many different ways. You can look to history.

27:23 So I think what you're doing can be very effective and thank you so much for addressing this farm bill. Yeah, thank you. And I wanna play another clip because yes, that one disruption at the House Agriculture Committee hearing on the farm bill was pretty extraordinary, but that's not their only disruption. So I'm gonna play another one that occurred. Watch it and then we're gonna talk about it on the other side. It's pretty dramatic. Dollars bailing out the chicken and egg industry for a bird flu nightmare that they created. The USDA's mission is to create safe and nutritious foods.

28:07 Yet instead, you are the chicken industry's puppet, protecting an industry, making record profits and betraying America's health and safety. This industry forces billions of birds to live in squalid confinement, perfect conditions for new pandemics with a constant supply of new hosts. As I said on an earlier occasion- Defund factory farms! Defund factory farms!

28:50 Where are we going? Okay. Stop the bird flu bailout. Not another penny. Where are we going? Oh, darn. Stop the bird flu, I'm sorry, stop the bird flu bailout, stop the bird flu bailout, stop the bird flu bailout. So there you are, it's the USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack who is speaking, wow.

29:32 And that was a press club here meeting, so therefore there was a lot of media, but you know, I couldn't find that much coverage of it, which leads me to the next issue is that the media is completely complicit and is essentially bought and paid for because look at the advertisers, fast food and pharmaceuticals. The media is afraid to cover this, they're afraid to cover the issues because they know how powerful the industries are. But I want to point out something that Vilsack said, I'm not sure if you heard it, in response to the protesters. He said, isn't it wonderful that we live in a democracy where people have freedom of speech? Something to that effect.

30:12 And now my response to him is, isn't it ironic that you are championing democracy when the food system that you are overseeing could not be less democratic and more elitist, allowing money and influence to control the food system against the better wishes of the American people, animals, the planet, climate crisis, everything that matters to us. You are overseeing one of the most authoritarian type of industries and you are allowing them to control it against our wishes.

30:53 That's what I'd love to tell him in response to that. Yeah, it's corporate socialism. That's the irony is bailing out these massive corporations and some of them are even owned by American individuals. I mean, Smithfield Food is owned by a Chinese corporation, it's the largest producer in the world. It's owned by a Chinese corporation. Like why are we bailing out animal agriculture with our tax dollars? So it's really very interesting that people who talk about free market, this isn't a free market. It's corporate socialism. All right. Let's continue on. Wow. We've got so many callers.

31:34 We're going to run through them quick. So Emick in Los Angeles, quick question or thought. Thank you. Hi. Hello. Hi, Jane. Hi, Robert. Thank you so much. Great action. So the farm bill may be a local issue in the United States, but animal agriculture is a global problem that everybody has to join. And I just watched Christ within it was really inspiring for me. I'm wondering if you could get together with the religious leaders to start a global movement around this, or if you know of anything like that. Thank you very much. Thank you. Yeah. Religious leaders. Yeah, go ahead.

32:18 That's a great question. And I wish I had a good answer, but I will say what our strategy is for the reason why we focus on bird flu, the reason why we focus on the farm bill is because it's in the news cycle because it's a story we want to insert ourselves into stories that are relevant to our demands, to our message of wanting a just transition to a plant-based slaughter-free food system. If you find in your country opportunities, stories in the news to do this, then I would say seize the moment and we'll help you if we can from afar to organise an effort to get attention by power holders and get your message out to them and to the public, right?

33:07 Because ultimately what we're doing here is trying to build popular support for a movement, not just vegans, but beyond that, because we need three to 5%, right? And we think we have a vast potential for support for not bailing out the animal agriculture industry. All right. Let's get to some other callers. Steve in Dallas, Texas, your question or thought? How about Matt? Matt in Franklin, Indiana, your question or thought? Yes. Yes. Hello. Yeah, I'm very outraged over this whole thing, you know, bailing out the animal agriculture industry.

33:51 And I just wanted to ask Robert his thoughts on, you know, this whole thing with the current crisis we have with basically the animal agriculture industry, basically getting all of these, you know, capitalising on these, you know, migrants that, you know, are basically just capitalising on, you know, what they're going through, you know, trying to, you know, seek refuge, you know, and, you know, basically the government using them as like pawns, you know, to continue this vicious cycle of violence to non-human animals.

34:32 And I just wanted to know your thoughts on that. Wow. That's a really good question because there's been a lot of reporting about how really those who are forced to do the killing are at the lowest end of the economic scale. So you have migrants, there are scandals involving children, underage labour being used in factory farming, particularly in slaughterhouses, as well as prisoners just released from prison who end up being funnelled to factory farms and slaughterhouses. Take it away, Robert Grillo. Yeah, I mean, the worker exploitation component is just yet another component to our case against the industry with the reason why we shouldn't be bailing them out.

35:16 So workers, communities, public health and safety, animals, climate crisis, all of these things bolster our case for why we should not, at the very least, right, not the most we can do, but the very least we should not be paying to bail out this industry, which, by the way, doesn't want to see bailouts for any other industries. They don't want to see welfare programmes for poor Americans, but they're fine already billionaires taking our money to bail them out for things that they can actually afford. And this, you know, so the worker component here is important. And there's connections between how humans and workers are animalised, you know, basically treated like animals.

36:04 They often say that they feel like they're being treated like animals. So the parallels are striking and disturbing. It really is so disturbing. And what I find the most disturbing is the blindness, the wilful blindness of people who are otherwise environmentalists, feminists for equal rights, for civil rights, for all sorts of rights. And yet they don't see the connection to what's happening in the animal agriculture industry is is the ultimate exploitation of humans and animals and the environment. And we're going to be paying a price increasingly as extreme weather becomes more and more of an everyday phenomenon.

36:47 All right. I think we're going to go to Annie in Sherman Oaks. If you're still there, Annie, take it away. Hi, thank you, Jane. Thank you, Robert. I'm honoured to say that I've done activism with you and organised. And one of the things I have to say is that people always want to choose food or the social veganism over activism. We are at a time that we can not only afford doing that. I'm more than happy to do tabling. I'm more than happy to do social veganism. However, we all need to organise and do activism. We don't have a choice as vegans.

37:28 We need to speak up and do it directly because we're ignored in every level. We do signing, we do letters, we do everything. But one of the things that is most effective, the reason we're having this conversation today is because of Robert's amazing, incredible, heroic bravery. So people, I encourage you, please, we need your help. We have very few people showing up anytime we do activism. And what is the outcome? This is about the world. This is not only about us. This is not about only the food. It's about suffering of the animals, suffering of the humans. You're making excellent points, Annie. And I think if I had to summarise it, I would say veganism is not a social club.

38:14 It's not just about going to great restaurants. Hey, I went to a great vegan restaurant last night. That's wonderful. But it's not just about that. It's about being an activist because we're a very small percentage of the population. So we need to be out there going in the discomfort zone. You know, I wrote a song about how protesting is a grind. You know, nobody particularly enjoys it, but it's what moves the needle. Yeah. Can I can I respond to something that Annie said? By the way, it's nice to have you on the call, Annie. Thank you for your kind words and also participating in some of the work we've done in L.A. So, you know, I think one of the biggest obstacles to activism is people thinking that they can't make a difference, that they will say there's many variations on this, that power holders, you know, congressional people don't care, we can't get them to care or that you can't fight city hall.

39:12 You've heard that one a lot or that, you know, you just can't fight corruption. Now, I want to say there's there's a couple of ways to respond to this. But one of the most important is that it's false, that it ignores the examples all around us that we have of power, people power, grassroots movements that shift power in the right direction, like Black Lives Matter. And so we have to we have to believe that that that change is possible through people powered movements. It is also think about what a position of privilege it is to say that you can't change powerful people.

39:54 It think about all of the other movements that have done this. All of the privileges and freedoms and rights that we enjoy. We enjoy the labour of others, the blood, sweat and tears of other activists, of other generations that fought for the rights that we enjoy. So we should never, ever forget that and realise that the struggle continues today. And the food system is ground zero for that struggle because so much depends, so much hinges on what happens to the future of our food system. Well, let's talk a little bit now, take a break from some of the callers and talk about what is actually happening to the Farm Bill.

40:36 You have the House, you have the Senate. You've got committees. Where exactly do we stand? And pointing out that while they're supposed to resolve all this in September, they really have until the end of the year to resolve it. And there's some very, very pernicious wording that has been stuck in some of the proposed Farm Bill legislation. Take it away. Well, so we have, you know, we're going to have there's going to be the House version of the Farm Bill and there's going to be the Senate version. The House version is steered by Thompson, Representative Thompson, a big Republican and many of his Republican fans and on the committee.

41:21 And the Senate side is controlled by Democrats. The leader, Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow of Michigan. She's the senator of Michigan. So the big difference here is one of the big differences is the Democrats are focused on what they call a crop insurance programme, which is, I don't know, maybe a trillion dollars or something. It's huge. And what the crop insurance means is that if a farmer has a crop failure, that the government will come in and pay them a fair price for for their loss. OK, the problem with the crop insurance programme is that it excludes all but feed for livestock.

42:03 So if you grow corn and soy and alfalfa, you're golden. You're part of that crop insurance programme. You'll benefit from it. But if you grow vegetables, grains, seeds, nuts, mushrooms, you're exempt. So all they're doing, both versions are terrible. All of they're doing is incentivising the growth of animal agriculture. And and the plant based alternative plant based protein. They're not incentivising. They're not funding at all. So both versions are totally messed up. We don't endorse either one. We simply are using the Farm Bill negotiations to get attention on a different path forward, which is, of course, a plant based slaughter free food system.

42:52 All right. I want to jump in because yesterday I attended a very effective humane lead forum online where the humanely basically got everybody to call and or email their respective member of Congress. In my case, it's Ted Lieu. And a senator. And I I actually contacted both of my senators offices. And I spoke to three people, then the representative for Ted Lieu, the congressman, as well as the representatives for our two U.S. senators here in California. You can do this, too. And it was very effective. And essentially, there's a very short script.

43:34 It's what you said, Robert. It's the version that Thompson is putting out. Has language in it that would basically invalidate any state's attempt to improve animal welfare, for example. And the reason I'm putting this up is that put your phones on this QR code, which is what I did yesterday. And it literally sends you to an entire page where it makes it very easy for you to contact your senators and your members of Congress. So I'm urging everybody, if you're watching this, if you're listening, go to action.thehumaneleague.org forward slash Farm Bill.

44:19 I'll say it one more time. Action.thehumaneleague.org forward slash Farm Bill. If you're watching, put your phone in front of this QR code. It will take you right to a an action page where it's very easy for you to make those calls. And I have to say, you know, there's so much cynicism, but I spoke to three people. I didn't leave voicemails. Well, I did leave a message, but then I call back and I hit another button that allowed me to talk to a person. And, you know, I got really I had an interaction. It wasn't just like, yeah, yeah, you know, zip code. They asked me, OK, so tell me the wording again. What's the objectionable wording?

45:01 I will make sure that blah, blah, blah. What you're basically saying is you don't want any language in the House or the Senate version that tries to interfere with the rights of states to create laws to protect animals used for food or for anything else. So in the United States, you know, we have states' rights. And ironically, the people who are already always arguing for states' rights are now trying to eliminate the right of states to create laws and propositions such as Proposition 12 that will protect animals. So again, take your phone and put it on this QR code and get active.

45:43 It's actually a lot of fun. And, you know, you can also take a snapshot of this QR code if you're not in the mood to do it right this second. But take a snapshot. That's what I did. I took a snapshot. Then I went into the snapshot and I followed it. And it was really easy. And you know what? It made me feel good because here I am watching Robert Grillo. I'm watching Robert Grillo get arrested and I'm thinking, what am I doing? But then after I made those calls and I had conversations with my member of Congress, Ted Lieu's office, as well as the two senators from California's offices, I felt better and I felt, well, I'm doing something.

46:23 I try never to ask people to do things that I don't want to do myself. It's not difficult. It's easy. Go ahead, Robert. If I can just say a few things in response to that. So let's just say it's all good. And it's a very important thing for. Yeah, I completely agree that states should have independent rights over certain legislation. Let's say that the EATS Act does get defeated and all of these groups like the Humane League can claim victory and say, wow, we defeated the EATS Act. That's wonderful. And it's it's like stopping Sisyphus from sliding further down the hill. Right. Because we got him up to a certain point with some at least some basic protections for animals and Prop 12.

47:07 Some some would argue very modest. Others would say very significant. But whatever you believe, we stop Sisyphus from sliding down the mountain. Right. By by defeating the EATS Act. However, the underlying problem of money in politics still exists. And there will be other attempts like the EATS Act that are just as pernicious until we address properly the problem with money in politics. And I know it sounds like a big issue, but guess what? Many other groups and movements are also confronting this. We can this is an opportunity to collaborate with other social movements on getting money out of politics.

47:51 If we do it successfully, we cut out a lot of this power and influence from the meat industry, which is what we want. OK, I agree with you, but I in the sense that it's not mutually exclusive. You can fight specific, pernicious elements of a bill. You could also fight the whole idea of money in in politics. So do it. Do it all. Do it all. Do it all. We choose to focus on calling out the corruption that exists that even makes things like the EATS Act possible and calling for a future where we transition to a plant based food system.

48:32 We want to get that vision out to the public and to the power holders. Let me tell you what a David Goliath battle we're in. The World Bank recently issued a report that essentially encouraged governments around the world to stop subsidising meat and dairy and start subsidising alternative proteins more. Now you think, wow, that's a big, big thing. World Bank, very powerful entity that funds to the billions of dollars and has a lot of clout. Well, guess what? Nobody picked up on the story. I mean, I had to go to Green Queen. Shout out for Green Queen to get this story.

49:14 I'm looking, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, New York Times. I didn't see it anywhere. This is the problem. I'll give you another example. Last year, the New York Times did this article, Save the Planet, put down that hamburger. Researchers examined the diets of 55,000 people and found that vegans are responsible for 75 % less in greenhouse gas emissions than meat eaters. Put another way, if everybody went vegan, they would reduce collectively the world's greenhouse gas emissions by 75%. Wow. That's an answer to the climate crisis.

49:54 Headlines, right? No. That story did not get prominence and nobody picked it up. I looked for it on CNN. I looked for it on MSNBC. Did not get picked up. So the truth is you're not getting the information. Not only are we in a David and Goliath battle against government and corporation, but we're also in a David Goliath battle against the media, which is why I started Unchained TV, the world's only plant-based streaming network. So I will tell you right now, I'm urging everybody, please take a moment to download it. It's very easy to download. It's the world's only vegan streaming television network. You can just go to your phone's app store and put in Unchained TV, one word, and you can also get it on your TV.

50:40 Very easy. If you see behind me, I have a Samsung TV. You just go to the Samsung TV smart hub and you go in there and put in Unchained TV. And there it is. You can drag that icon. I drag it right next to Netflix and Amazon Prime. So it's free. There's 2000 videos. This video is playing live right now on Unchained TV. Part of your activism, support Unchained TV as part of your activism. You can literally text this video or any other video on Unchained TV to anybody. You can text it by just going here.

51:20 It comes up and then you hit text and you can send it. If you have a relative, a friend or somebody who says, you know what? It's not so bad. You can text them Earthlings. If you have a friend who says, gee, I can never give up cheese. You can give them a vegan cheese recipe. We have hundreds of cooking shows on there. I'm urging people support us. We created this, but we cannot do it alone. And we are a 501C3 nonprofit. So that's one of the things that I wanted to tell everybody. Yeah, one of my videos is playing right now is that we need your support as well. We've only got a couple of minutes.

52:00 I need to talk to you about ventilation shutdown. We're saving the most horrific for last. Give us a small, short explanation of this horror show. Can I also just tell you something about the New York Times that was very satisfying to us since you brought that up? So we know we our goal is to change the discourse, to amplify the discourse on the bird flu problem and on a plant based food system. Right. Yes. So when we saw the headline of the New York Times one day shortly after our Vilsack disruption at the at the the Washington Press Club, where we didn't get much press. Right. Right. But what was so rewarding was to see a headline in The New York Times that I'm paraphrasing that is is killing millions of chickens and giving millions of dollars to the poultry industry really the way to solve the bird flu crisis.

52:57 And it was a sceptical article from our point of view, what we have been going to rooms and to get thrown out for saying we're getting thrown out of rooms with power holders like Tom Vilsack and Senator, you know, senators committees for saying the same thing. To see that on the cover of The New York Times was very gratifying. It's showing us that we are our our message, our point of view is getting into mainstream media. It is. And it's sad that somebody has to get arrested for them to cover it because you had to get arrested to get that point across. And that's not the way it should work.

53:39 I always say we do all these freedom of information acts and reports and nothing. But then if we take our clothes off, not me personally, but other activists or we get arrested again, not me personally, but people like you, then we get coverage. And that's unfair. We shouldn't have to get arrested or get naked to have the mainstream media cover our issue. We've got two minutes. Ventilation shutdown. Tell us what it is. Well, ventilation shutdown is, you know, without getting too technical, it's basically cooking birds alive. It's turning up the heat in a closed environment and until they they suffocate, until they die of heat stroke. And, you know, the industry has been doing heat stroke tests on birds for decades.

54:22 That's something if you would have talked to the late Karen Davis about, she knew all about this. The universities, the poultry science departments of all these universities do all these experiments on chickens to see how much heat stroke they can take before they die. They do it on millions of birds. And this is how they perfected ventilation shutdown. It's also the cheapest way to kill the largest number of birds. It's illegal in other countries because it's considered so immoral. But it's legal here and it's cheap and fast. What more can you say? It's horrendous. It's horrendous. And our tax dollars are being forced to subsidise it, which is truly, truly upsetting.

55:02 And, you know, sometimes I just wonder about the stupidity factor because climate change is getting worse. And the news media, while they love the mainstream news media to cover the catastrophe porn, the fires, the floods, people crying, my house is gone. But then when a solution comes up that is obvious, like going plant based, not only do they not cover it, they attack it. They attack it because they're repeating meat industry talking points mindlessly. And to me, that's stupidity because it's going to bite everybody, including corporations, including the media, including the airline industry.

55:43 I mean, it's disrupting everything. And it's and we're in the very first stages of it. So keep fighting the good fight, everybody. Download Unchained TV, get involved, go to the protests and together we can really make an impact. You are an inspiration. Let's hear it for Robert Grillo from Free From Harm. Come back soon. Thank you, Jane. Lovely to see you again. You too.