Breaking news and publications from Direct Action Everywhere.
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TOP PRESS
October 9, 2024
The Intercept
Videos shared with The Intercept prior to the report’s public release show, among other scenes, lambs with their throats slit hanging upside down and thrashing on the slaughter line; one animal with an internal organ that has been torn inside-out and left dangling behind it as it heads to slaughter; injured lambs being led to slaughter; workers laughing, spanking animals, and engaging in simulated sex acts with nearby machinery as lambs are having their throats slit; and the apparent use of so-called Judas sheep — adult sheep kept alive at the facility and used to lead the young sheep to slaughter.
TOP PRESS
October 9, 2024
The Intercept
PRESS
March 16, 2025
Press Democrat
A group of 15 protesters staged demonstrations inside and outside of a Petaluma grocery store Saturday to decry what they say is animal cruelty at chicken farms operated by Petaluma Poultry.
PRESS
March 16, 2025
Press Democrat
PRESS RELEASE
March 15, 2025
The protest spotlighted the zoonotic pathogens found at Petaluma Poultry, including salmonella, campylobacter, antibiotic-resistant Enterococcus, and Clostridium perfringens. Two protestors wore the type of biosecurity suits that are required for investigations and held yellow caution tape in front of the store’s meat section, which contains chickens slaughtered at Perdue’s Petaluma Poultry slaughterhouse
PRESS RELEASE
March 15, 2025
PRESS
March 12, 2025
Sonoma State Star
Following Rosenberg’s March 3 hearing regarding her remaining charges, activists from Direct Action Everywhere gathered on the sidewalk outside the home of Jason Arnold, Perdue Farms’ director of operations, to protest his role in the factory farm industry.
PRESS
March 12, 2025
Sonoma State Star
BLOG
March 6, 2025
We have already begun to develop a large, trained, and coordinated network of chapters across the state, and to create a factory farm map and resource guide that will become the go-to source for information about industrialized animal agriculture in California.
PRESS RELEASE
March 3, 2025
“If Ms. Rosenberg had rescued a drowning dog from a neighbor’s pool, she would be applauded, not prosecuted,” said Mr. Carraway. “The fact is, California law does not distinguish between rescuing a dog from a pool and rescuing sick and injured chickens from a slaughterhouse. Those who profit off animal agriculture may not like it, but that is the law.”
PRESS
March 2, 2025
SF Gate
Activists opposed to one of America's biggest poultry producers protested sales of Perdue Farms products at a Berkeley Trader Joe's on Saturday. Animal welfare advocates inside and outside the store urged the retailer to stop selling products slaughtered by Perdue's Petaluma Poultry.
PRESS RELEASE
March 1, 2025
Outside the store, protestors set up a “human meat” display with an activist covered in fake blood and lying on a tray wrapped in plastic to represent the abused chickens whose plastic-wrapped bodies are sold at Trader Joe’s.
PRESS RELEASE
March 1, 2025
PRESS
February 26, 2025
Wisconsin News 3 Now
Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) entered Ridglan Farms in the dark of night. The team conducted what’s referred to as an ‘open rescue', a tactic used by animal rights activists wherein they openly and publicly describe what they have done. This differs from secretive or clandestine rescues. That night, the team took possession of three beagles which they later named Julie, Anna and Lucy. In 2021, the team was charged with felony burglary and theft.
PRESS
February 17, 2025
Countercurrents
In addressing Musk’s continued development of BCI’s, DxE organizer Carla Cabral said, “Elon Musk’s actions are a profound example of the link between animal and human cruelty. While animals such as monkeys and pigs are being tortured and killed for Musk’s financial gain, he’s actively spewing hate toward trans people, immigrant communities, and other marginalized groups. And the federal government has shown no willingness to hold Musk accountable..."
TOP PRESS
October 10, 2024
Vox
In principle, there’s a lot of sense in capping the size of factory farms. Measure J’s proponents are betting that progressive Sonoma County, better known for its tasting rooms than its slaughterhouses, can push California — and the nation — in that direction.
TOP PRESS
October 9, 2024
The Intercept
Videos shared with The Intercept prior to the report’s public release show, among other scenes, lambs with their throats slit hanging upside down and thrashing on the slaughter line; one animal with an internal organ that has been torn inside-out and left dangling behind it as it heads to slaughter; injured lambs being led to slaughter; workers laughing, spanking animals, and engaging in simulated sex acts with nearby machinery as lambs are having their throats slit; and the apparent use of so-called Judas sheep — adult sheep kept alive at the facility and used to lead the young sheep to slaughter.
TOP PRESS
August 30, 2024
San Francisco Chronicle
In dimly lit indoor aisles at Weber Family Farms in Petaluma, hundreds of thousands of white chickens live out their 90 weeks of life. They fly from perch to perch. They dust bathe in the bedding. They nip at water dispensers. They lay egg after egg. And they never leave. These barns are at the heart of a bitter fight that Mike Weber and Samantha Faye are waging for the future of local farming.
TOP PRESS
April 4, 2024
Los Angeles Times
Lewis Bernier, an animal rights activist supporting the initiative, said he has visited several factory farms across the country, documenting inhumane treatment, and one farm in Sonoma County stands out as having “the worst and most systemic animal cruelty that I’ve ever seen.”
TOP PRESS
March 15, 2024
The New Yorker
Instead of planning actions, many activists now spend their time litigating microaggressions and small disputes within their ranks... As a response, [DxE co-founder Wayne] Hsiung has tried to promote a maxim of "braver spaces, not safer spaces," which encourages the animal rights community to put aside their individual concerns, if possible, and do things like risk felony jail time for the cause.
TOP PRESS
January 30, 2024
The Guardian
If successful in Berkeley, a liberal San Francisco Bay Area town that’s often been at the forefront of US environmental policy, the method can be replicated elsewhere, [activists] say. “We can pave the path to abolishing factory farming,” said Cassie King, an organizer with Direct Action Everywhere, one of the groups that pushed for the measure.
TOP PRESS
November 9, 2023
Vox
Hsiung’s trial and conviction show the extraordinary difficulty of trying to discuss what happens to animals on factory farms in a legal system that only sees them as property. At both factory farms in this case, DxE had documented gruesome conditions prior to their open rescue actions and had submitted animal cruelty complaints to authorities (though no action was taken by legal officials, King said). Yet it was the activists, not the farm owners, who were criminally charged and had to explain themselves to a jury.
TOP PRESS
November 8, 2023
Wired
For the first time, guerrilla animal rights group Direct Action Everywhere reveals a guide to its investigative tactics and toolkit, from spy cams to night vision and drones. Bernier says that DxE decided to publicly release its guide, even in the wake of Hsiung’s conviction, to help activists who are already committed to carrying out covert investigations do their work more safely and effectively.
TOP PRESS
November 4, 2023
The Intercept
Hsiung’s defense was in many ways stymied from the jump. The judge barred almost all photo and video evidence of animal cruelty from the trial, as has been the case in a number of previous DxE trials. As I’ve previously noted, the decision to disallow such evidence is usually made to benefit a defendant — not showing gruesome images of a murder victim, for example. Such logic has been flipped in DxE cases, including Hsiung’s most recent, to the benefit of powerful agribusiness.
BLOG
April 5, 2025
Perdue's legal complaint is riddled with false accusations meant to malign nonviolent activists and keep the attention off its abuse of animals.
BLOG
March 6, 2025
We have already begun to develop a large, trained, and coordinated network of chapters across the state, and to create a factory farm map and resource guide that will become the go-to source for information about industrialized animal agriculture in California.
BLOG
December 29, 2024
The silver lining of repression is that it gives movements the opportunity to prove how strong they are. While the past year has been hard, I feel incredibly grateful for all of the ways the animal rights movement has grown and persevered.
BLOG
December 12, 2024
“Do we have factory farms in Berkeley?” was a common response I got when collecting signatures. I explain that we want to prevent another animal gambling operation from opening up in Golden Gate Fields’ absence. Plus, Berkeley can be the first municipality to ban CAFOs and set a precedent that other places can follow. Berkeley voters understood. They signed the petition, and this November, they voted yes. Measure DD passed with 62% “YES” votes, making history for animal and environmental protection.
BLOG
September 10, 2024
If people do not believe that they can change a situation, they will never act to do so. If we do not believe that animal liberation is possible and that we can make it happen, it never will. In fact, animal agriculture and other unjust systems rely on our hopelessness and cynicism.
BLOG
April 29, 2024
My findings show that “No Antibiotics Ever” just means that the chickens are still experiencing severe infection but they aren’t receiving the medication they desperately need. In one barn at a Petaluma Poultry factory farm in Santa Rosa, more than 10% of the chickens died by the time they reached 5 weeks. That is more than double the accepted industry mortality rate.
BLOG
December 26, 2023
The Sonoma County Court's actions didn't stop me but, instead, spurred me to further action just as it did for many others.
BLOG
December 2, 2023
Whether I lose my freedom for days, weeks, months, or even years, it is worth it to give even one or two animals a chance to experience freedom for the first time in their entire lives.
BLOG
October 1, 2023
To everyone who doesn’t believe in a better world, I understand. I feel your pain and I know how hard it is to keep going in a world as painful as ours. But, just a glimmer of hope saved Vincent’s life and it might just save the rest of the animals, too. So please, don’t give up.
PRESS RELEASE
November 12, 2024
A coalition of groups, including the Berkeley-based animal rights network Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) and Compassionate Bay, led the effort to gather the signatures to get this CAFO ban on the ballot.
PRESS RELEASE
November 1, 2024
Zoe Rosenberg, 22, faces criminal charges for rescuing chickens from Perdue’s Petaluma Poultry slaughterhouse in Petaluma, CA
PRESS RELEASE
October 29, 2024
Superior Farms is the largest industrial lamb slaughterhouse in the country, and is the subject of Ordinance 309 in Denver, an initiative on the November ballot introduced by Pro-Animal Future that would ban slaughterhouses within city limits
PRESS RELEASE
August 20, 2024
Charges to be Dismissed for Third Time in Perdue Chicken Rescue Case
PRESS RELEASE
August 15, 2024
Animal rights activists with Direct Action Everywhere disrupted Florence at events across the country in recent months calling for the move
PRESS RELEASE
July 20, 2024
On Saturday evening, animal rights activists protested inside and outside of Miller & Lux, an upscale steakhouse in Mission Bay that is owned by celebrity chef Tyler Florence. The protesters were calling on Florence to cut ties with Perdue’s Petaluma Poultry. They marched and chanted through the restaurant, holding signs that read “Drop Petaluma Poultry” and “Stop Supporting Perdue’s Petaluma Poultry’s Criminal Animal Abuse.”
PRESS RELEASE
July 19, 2024
The Ramona factory farm was the site of a 2019 animal cruelty investigation by Direct Action Everywhere
PRESS RELEASE
May 13, 2024
Berkeley student in Perdue poultry case now faces 1 felony and 3 misdemeanors
PRESS RELEASE
March 8, 2024
Today, in a stunning development, the State of Wisconsin moved to dismiss charges against three animal rights activists accused of rescuing three beagles from Ridglan Farms, one of the last two remaining large breeders of dogs for vivisection in the country. Judge Mario White granted the dismissal at a hearing this morning.
