National poultry giant Perdue Foods just filed a lawsuit against Direct Action Everywhere and our lead organizer Almira Tanner, requesting an injunction to bar us from protesting outside the home of one of their executives, Jason Arnold. Arnold is the Director of Operations at Perdue's Petaluma Poultry slaughterhouse, where whistleblowers have documented criminal animal cruelty, including evidence of animals being boiled alive. We are asking him to stop this cruelty or cut ties with Perdue.

Instead, they are suing us to try to silence us.

Perdue's legal complaint is riddled with false accusations meant to malign nonviolent activists and keep the attention off its abuse of animals. In the complaint, Perdue calls our perfectly legal and peaceful protests a "campaign of terror." What's truly terrifying is the torture of defenseless animals happening inside Perdue's operations.

This lawsuit is yet another example of powerful corporations using their vast financial resources against activists to silence free speech and keep their crimes hidden from the public. It is a textbook SLAPP suit—a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation—using Perdue's multibillion-dollar resources to try to crush free speech through expensive litigation.

Perdue wants to cover up the truth, but with your help, we can bring even more attention to their crimes against animals.‍

Please share the news about this lawsuit on Instagram and/or Facebook to expose Perdue's attempts to silence activists.

We won't be intimidated. We will continue to speak up about the extreme cruelty animals endure at Perdue's Petaluma Poultry and we will keep protesting the businesses that sell these abused animals. In fact, on May 3rd and 4th, DxE activists across the country will participate in a nationwide weekend of action protesting Trader Joe's, one of the biggest retailers that sources from Petaluma Poultry. We are once again asking them to cut ties. You can learn more about the weekend of action on the event page here. Please consider joining one of these actions, or if you want to organize your own action in your city, please email info@directactioneverywhere.com.