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Bull Riding Fans Confront Animal Rights Protesters at Madison Square Garden

January 10, 2024 by Leave a Comment


The News

“Fuck the bulls.  Fuck the bulls.”

As animal rights activists protested a Professional Bull Riding (PBR) event at NYC’s Madison Square Garden (MSG), fans heading inside greeted them with obscenities, remarks about eating meat and nervous smiles. The reactions came as no surprise to the activists, who have protested year-after-year in an effort to educate the public about the cruelty associated with bull riding.

“Bulls don’t naturally buck,” said Nora Constance Marino, an attorney who organizes the annual PBR protest at Madison Square Garden. “The bull riders use cruel methods to provoke them that may include shocking them with electric prods, jabbing them with spurs, squeezing them with flank straps and twisting their tails. Everything about this so-called sport is inhumane.”

Photo of a man riding on the back of a bull at Madison Square Garden

Bull riders use weapons including electric prods, spurs and flank straps to provoke bulls into bucking

While most of the PBR patrons ignored the protesters, several stopped to say that they had misgivings about attending. Some agreed that bull riding is inhumane, and others said they came only because they received free tickets.

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Watch bull riding fans clash with #animalrights activists protesting the Professional Bull Riding (PBR) show at Madison Square Garden. A few of PBR’s corporate sponsors are tagged. #animalcruelty #bullrider

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A few patrons defended the “sport,” stating that the “bulls are treated better than people.” After speaking to Edita Birnkrant, a protester who said that some of the bulls are injured and killed, one devoted PBR fan acknowledged that she could be correct. “It’s possible,” he said.

Photo of bulls being transported in a trailer and held in holding pen before a bull riding event

PBR transports bulls around the country in trailers and stores them in holding pens at bull riding arenas

For years, activists in NYC have called on the management at MSG to stop hosting the PBR. In 2019 and early 2020, before the pandemic, the Animal Cruelty Exposure Fund (ACEF), Marino’s organization, staged protests at the Upper East Side home of then MSG Sports President Andrew Lustgarten. His neighbors told the activists that they suspect the protests led him to move out of the building.

Photo of animal rights activists protesting bull riding at Madison Square Garden

Animal rights activists in NYC protest bull riding at Madison Square Garden

According to PETA, animals used in rodeo events, including bull riding, “commonly sustain broken bones, punctured lungs, snapped necks, or torn muscles, and they sometimes die in an arena.”

Photo of PBR's corporate sponsors

Cruelty to animals violates the corporate social responsibility policies espoused by many of the PBR’s sponsors, but that doesn’t stop them from underwriting the bull riding tour.


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Anti-Trophy Hunting Activists Protest Trump Brothers and Safari Club International

February 28, 2023 by Leave a Comment


The News

On February 25th, approximately 30 animal rights activists in New York City staged a disruption in the lobby of Trump Tower as part of the Worldwide Rally Against Trophy Hunting (WRATH), an annual multi-city demonstration produced by CompassionWorks International. Organizers of the NYC rally chose Trump Tower because Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump have participated in many well-publicized trophy hunts and have posted photos with their victims.

Activists also staged rallies in Denver, Chicago, Birmingham (U.K.) and Nashville, where Safari Club International’s annual hunting convention took place. WRATH, which is timed to coincide with the annual convention, aims to “raise awareness about the ego-driven and senseless murder of countless wild animals by trophy hunters.”

Photos of Worldwide Rally Against Trophy Hunting event in New York City

During the Worldwide Rally Against Trophy Hunting, animal rights activists in NYC staged a die-in in Trump Tower in memory of the animals who Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump slaughtered on their trophy hunting expeditions. After the lobby disruption, the activists continued the rally on busy Fifth Avenue.

In NYC, organizers rented a mobile billboard that projected images of trophy hunters, including the Trumps, and played a wrap song called Hunter! Listen up by Entyce. The song is featured in TheirTurn’s video about the NYC rally.

Photo of anti-trophy hunting mobile billboard

As part of the Worldwide Rally Against Trophy Hunting (WRATH), a mobile billboard driving through Midtown Manhattan displayed images of trophy hunters and their victims

After protesting and staging a die in inside of Trump Tower, the activists exited the building and conducted educational outreach with tourists in the bustling midtown neighborhood. While most of the pedestrians who acknowledged the rally were supportive, some Trump supporters and hunters taunted the activists.

Photo of hunter confronting activists during Worldwide Rally Against Trophy Hunting

In an apparent effort to taunt WRATH participants, a pedestrian repeatedly stated that hunting is fun and encouraged protesters to try it.

In 2015, anti-trophy hunting sentiment moved into the mainstream when Cecil, a beloved lion in Zimbabwe, was shot and killed by Walter Palmer, a big game hunter from Minnesota. The killing of Cecil, which was widely reported in mainstream media outlets, led U.S. Fish and Wildlife to add lions in Africa and India to the endangered species list, making it more difficult for Americans to partake in lion hunting.

Photo of Walter Palmer, the notorious trophy hunter who killed Cecil, a beloved lion in Zimbabwe

Walter Palmer, a trophy hunter from Minnesota, killed and beheaded Cecil, a beloved lion in Zimbabwe.


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Animal Rights Activists and Bull Riding Fans Face Off During Protests at Madison Square Garden

January 10, 2023 by Leave a Comment


The News

Dozens of animal rights activists with Animal Cruelty Exposure Fund and PETA staged three days of protests at Madison Square Garden as spectators entered the annual bull riding show hosted by the Professional Bull Riders (PBR). While some of the PBR fans took a handout explaining why bull riding is inhumane, most of them either ignored or taunted the activists, encouraging them to “get a job” and “eat steak.” According to the protesters, none of them defended bull riding by stating that the bulls are treated well or that the practice is humane.

“The bulls are stuffed into trailers, hauled around the country and provoked with cattle prods, flank straps and spurs to get them to buck,” said Nora Constance Marino, President of Animal Cruelty Exposure Fund (ACEF), a New York-based animal rights organization. “If they want to partake in bull riding, they can use mechanical bulls.”

According to PETA, animals used in rodeo events, including bull riding, “commonly sustain broken bones, punctured lungs, snapped necks, or torn muscles, and they sometimes die in an arena. Anyone who cares about animals should avoid these spectacles of suffering.”

Photo of bull bucking during PBR bull riding event

Bull riders provoke bulls into bucking with cattle prods, flank straps and spurs

ACEF, PETA and other local animal rights groups have been protesting the annual bull riding show at Madison Square Garden for at least ten years. In 2021, their efforts were bolstered by New York State Assembly Member Linda Rosenthal, who introduced legislation that would prevent bull riding from taking place in the state by banning the tools that bull riders use to make the animals buck. The bill is pending in the legislature’s agriculture committee.

Photo of a bill in NY State that would effectively ban bull riding

In 2021, NY State Assembly Member Linda Rosenthal introduced legislation that would end bull fighting in the state by banning the tools used to provoke the bulls into bucking (click photo to see legislation)

In addition to demonstrating at the bull riding events, NYC activists have staged six anti-rodeo protests at the Manhattan home of Andrew Lustgarten, the CEO of Madison Square Garden. Based on feedback from his neighbors, the activists speculate that the protests led him to move out of his luxury condominium on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

The PBR is sponsored by several national corporations. Its largest sponsor is Monster, the energy drink company.

Photo of logos of the corporations that sponsor the Professional Bull Riders

Professional Bull Riders Corporate Sponsors


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What Happened to Carolyn Maloney’s Pandas?

August 24, 2022 by Leave a Comment


The News

Carolyn Maloney, a U.S. Congresswoman who spent several years attempting to lease a pair of giant pandas from China and put them on display in New York City, has been voted out of office. Maloney lost the Democratic primary to fellow incumbent Congressman Jerry Nadler, who signed Voters for Animal Rights “No to Pandas in Captivity” pledge.

Carolyn Maloney pandas

Carolyn Maloney’s election loss brings an official end to her quest to import pandas into NYC. It also brings an end to the animal rights campaign to stop it.

In 2016, Maloney partnered with two prominent billionaires, John Catsimatidis and Hank Greenberg, to create a not-for-profit organization “to raise funds to bring panda bears to New York City.” Money raised by The Pandas are Coming to NYC, Inc. would be used to lease two giant pandas from a breeding facility in China; to build a “pavilion” in Central Park in which to display them; and to pay for their care. Maloney’s motives for embarking on this expensive and complicated undertaking are unclear, though she and her partners on the project claim that the presence of pandas would bring joy to New Yorkers and tourists.

New York Times story about Carolyn Maloney's quest to import pandas from China to NYC

Carolyn Maloney spent several years raising money to lease a pair of giant pandas from China and put them on display in NYC. NYC’s animal rights community fought against the plan.

From the outset, the plan had one influential detractor, the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCF), which runs the Central Park Zoo. For Maloney, the zoo was the most obvious place to put the pandas on display, but the WCF didn’t want the pandas because they are expensive and require more care than most other wild animals in zoos.  WCF’s opposition did not deter Maloney, at least at first. She and her partners said they would build a stand-alone “panda pavilion” in the park.

Animal rights activist protest Carolyn Maloney's effort to lease pandas from China

Animal Rights activists protest Carolyn Maloney’s plan to lease a pair of giant pandas from China and put them on display in a “Panda Pavilion” in NYC

In 2017, Maloney, Catsimatidis and Greenberg, hosted a fundraising gala at the Waldorf Astoria to raise money to lease and display the pandas. The gala raised approximately $125,000 for The Pandas are Coming to NYC Inc., a fraction of the tens of millions of dollars needed for the project. Still, positive media coverage of the “Black & White Panda Ball” generated widespread public awareness and gave the project momentum.

Carolyn Maloney, John Catsimatidis and Hank Greenberg at the Black & White Panda Ball

U.S. Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney is flanked by Maurice Greenberg and John Catsimatidis, billionaires who backed her plan to lease pandas from China and display them in NYC.

Within weeks of the Panda Ball, the NYC-based animal rights group TheirTurn launched a campaign to discourage Maloney and her partners from moving forward with this project. After sending them letters and launching a social media campaign, activists began staging provocative protests at their public events with the message that pandas, like all wild animals, exist for their own purposes; that they belong in their natural habitat, and that they should not be held captive in an exhibit for our amusement.

During an encounter with protesters in Midtown Manhattan, John Catsimatidis invited TheirTurn’s Donny Moss onto his radio show to discuss the concerns of the animal rights community. During the interview, he argued that “90% of NYers want the pandas,” according to a poll he commissioned.  He also revealed that he found a donor who is “contributing $10 million to build a panda pavilion.”

After the radio interview failed to sway Catsimatidis, TheirTurn organized a protest at the Fifth Avenue home of Hank Greenberg.  Several hours before the protest, Greenberg called Moss and asked him to cancel it. Like Catsimatidis, Greenberg defended the panda plan, scoffed at Moss’s objections and gave no indication that he and his colleagues would back down. That evening, dozens of activists staged the protest at his building.

In a subsequent letter to the plans’ backers, Moss suggested that they create a virtual reality exhibit in which visitors could observe and experience pandas in their natural habitat. In response, an executive who was working on the project wrote, “Not in a million years would these guys buy this.” Several months later and in response to the protests, the same individual wrote, “Actually I think you have done well.  It seems stalled and without constant momentum, these things die.” In the years that followed the Black and White Panda Ball, the panda project did, in fact, appear to fizzle. Maloney stopped fundraising, and the not-for-profit became inactive, according to its tax forms.

The local animal rights community does not know what impact the protests played in Maloney’s apparent decision to stop pursuing the pandas, but they are pleased.  “We encourage Congresswoman Maloney, John Catsimatidis and Hank Greenberg to donate the money they raised and no longer need for the panda pavilion to organizations that conserve wild animals in their natural habitat,” said Allie Taylor, president of Voters for Animal Rights, which opposed Maloney’s plan to import the pandas.

Carolyn Maloney petition

A petition calling on U.S. Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney to call of her plan to put pandas on display in NYC garnered almost 100,00 signatures


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Nonhuman Rights Project Rallies for Captive Elephant in Advance of Landmark Court Hearing 

May 4, 2022 by Leave a Comment


The News

On Saturday, April 30th, dozens of activists with the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP) staged a rally at the Bronx Zoo to demand that the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), which manages the zoo, release a 51 year old Asian elephant named Happy to a sanctuary after holding her captive in a small enclosure since 1977.

Happy was kidnapped from a forest in Thailand in 1971, and she has lived at the Bronx Zoo for 45 years. Despite the fact that elephants are highly social animals who travel long distances with their herds each day, Happy lives by herself and splits her time between on a one acre plot of land and a windowless, concrete room. 

Happy, who lives alone, splits her time between a windowless concrete room and a one acre plot of land at the Bronx Zoo.

NhRP, a nonprofit legal group that represents captive animals, staged the event in advance of Happy’s upcoming hearing at the Court of Appeals, New York’s highest court. During the hearing, lawyers with NhRP will argue that the Bronx Zoo and the Wildlife Conservation Society “have unlawfully deprived Happy of her freedom, imprisoning her alone in an exhibit that is too small to meet the needs of Happy or any elephant.” If NhRP wins the case at the Court of Appeals, then the WCS would be forced to send her to one of the two elephant sanctuaries in the United States. 

The Atlantic describes the Nonhuman Rights Project’s right to bodily liberty case on behalf of Happy “the most important animal rights case of the 21st century.”

Happy’s case advanced to the Court of Appeals after being heard in two lower courts. According to The Atlantic, it is “the most important animal-rights case of the 21st century.”

New York’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, will be hearing oral arguments in the Nonhuman Right Project’s case to grant bodily liberty to Happy, an elephant held captive at the Bronx Zoo.

Both of the elephant sanctuaries in the United States, the Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee and the Performing Animal Welfare Society in California, have agreed to take Happy at no cost to the Bronx Zoo, but the WCS has refused to let her go. “The Wildlife Conservation Society acknowledged in 2006 that keeping Happy alone would be inhumane, so we don’t understand why they won’t release her from captivity,” said Kevin Schneider, the Executive Director of NhRP. “They either don’t want to acknowledge that Happy’s captivity and solitary confinement are cruel, or they don’t want to cave into pressure from animal rights advocates.”

The Atlantic called the Nonhuman Rights Project’s Case on behalf of Happy the “most important animal rights case of the 21st century.”

In 2018, the NnRP filed a petition for a common law writ of habeas corpus in New York Supreme Court demanding recognition of Happy’s legal personhood and her fundamental right to bodily liberty. Happy is first elephant in the world to have a habeas corpus hearing to determine the lawfulness of her imprisonment.

As litigation has proceeded in recent years, public support for Happy’s freedom has grown. In 2019, two elected officials made public statements encouraging the WCS to free Happy. Corey Johnson, the Speaker of the New York City Council at the time, wrote, “Happy and all elephants need more space and resources than the zoo can provide, plain and simple. I urge the Bronx Zoo, which first planned to close the elephant exhibit back in 2006, to finally transfer Happy to one of two recommended sanctuaries so that she can enjoy the company of other elephants and the benefits afforded to a facility specifically designed to meet her needs.” In a tweet, U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who has voiced her opposition to solitary confinement for prison inmates, said that “The team and I are looking into what we can do” to free Happy.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a U.S. Congress  Member who represents the Bronx, offers her support to the Nonhuman Rights Project in its efforts to liberate Happy, an Asian elephant, from the Bronx Zoo

In 2021, the animal advocacy group In Defense of Animals ranked the Bronx Zoo the fifth worst zoo in the United States for elephants. “There are no good zoos for elephants. All zoos restrain these giant, complex animals through a lack of space and freedom of choice that all far-roaming animals require for their mental and physical health. Even zoos deemed to be the very best are failing elephants’ bodies, minds, and spirits.”

Dozens of animal rights activists participated in a rally organized by the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP) calling on the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) to release Happy, an Asian elephant, to a sanctuary.

Before NhRP’s rally, the Bronx Zoo shut down the entrance where the activists convened.  The closure appeared to be an effort to reduce the number of zoo visitors who would learn about Happy’s plight. The zoo also sent an employee to document the protest. As lawyers with NhRP delivered remarks to rally participants, this employee approached the group’s unattended bags. TheirTurn caught her in the act and confronted her on camera. NhRP staff members at the rally knew that she was employed by the zoo because they have seen her at court hearings.

A Change.org petition demanding an end to Happy’s solitary confinement has garnered over 1.4 million signatures. The petition targets to James Breheny, the Director of the Bronx Zoo. 


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