Infiltration from Within: PIJAC Sells Its Soul to the Devil

The animal community reacted in horror (a total understatement!) when the news broke that Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council (PIJAC) had hired Ed Sayres to be its new CEO.  Why is this bad?  Well its sort of like a doggy day care hiring Michael Vick to be in charge of "play time."  It's like hiring Jeffrey Dahmer to take your teenage son on a remote hike.  It's like putting Hitler in charge of a country...  Oh, wait......  Ed Sayres stands for the polar opposite of everything that PIJAC's membership is based on.  Ed Sayres used to be the head of the ASPCA, an animal rights group who advocates against pet ownership.  Ed Sayres was the co-founder of NYCLASS, the group devoted to getting rid of New York City carriage horses.  Ed Sayres is so hated by the herp crowd that they refer to him as a contract killer.  The ASPCA utterly opposes ownership of exotic animals. 

Then again, if you read between the lines, PIJAC has changed who its targeted audience is and who it is representing.  It no longer is the supporter of pet stores and the sales of pets, according to their press release, they are now supporting the "broader pet trade."  In other words, PIJAC is trying to save their own sinking ship.  Hints of this came when PIJAC suddenly announced they were going to work with HSUS and ASPCA to define what a puppy mill was, knowing that HSUS defines it as a single breeder having a single litter of puppies, ever.  One litter, that's it!  You are a puppy mill. 

“The ASPCA has witnessed first-­hand the unspeakable cruelty and horrific conditions of substandard puppy mills, and we are committed to working with key industry leaders to help end the inhumane treatment of dogs in these facilities,” said ASPCA President & CEO Ed Sayres. “We are pleased that the industry has come together in a meaningful way to acknowledge this abuse, and confront it head on.”

That was then. This is now:

In retrospect, given the nature of the ASPCA’s mission, I had a rather limited view during my tenure as the organization’s CEO, responding in the field to horrific substandard operators who represent a small minority of breeders — not the majority. My view in light of those circumstances formed the basis for the statements I made during that period and campaigns that were developed under my leadership. I know now that I was misinformed about the majority of breeders who work diligently to raise puppies humanely and to find lifetime homes through retail channels. While many in the animal welfare field still want to paint all breeders with the same low standards brush, I look forward to opening their eyes to the true nature of the breeding business. Ed Sayres

If you believe that, I've got a bridge to sell you, over some swamp land, that I do not own.  But as they say, there's a fool born every minute.

If you are wondering what that "broader pet trade" is, wonder no longer.  PIJAC now supports the fraudulent rescue mill trade.  The choice of Ed Sayres is no coincidence with this change of direction.  After all, less than a year ago, under Sayres leadership, ASPCA launched a national "No Pet Store Puppies" campaign.   PIJAC is supposed to be a lobbyist for pet stores.  Doesn't that make your head spin?  

Dog breeders in America were already reeling at the news of a PIJAC funded Purdue study on "breeders standards" for dogs under the dubious claim that we pet breeders need "uniform standards" and do not have them nationwide.  If we don't have uniform dog breeder standards nationwide, then what are the hundreds and hundreds of pages of APHIS regulations for?  The APHIS Inspection Guide alone clocks in at 418 pages and that's just for inspections.  That's not the actual regulations on dog breeding.  The federal government already regulates dog breeding from the largest kennels to your Aunt Millie having a litter of puppies in her bedroom.  The federal government regulates down to the square inch how much space an animal is supposed to have.  Dog breeders have no breeder standards in what fantasy world?  

The animal rights extremists who infiltrated the APHIS division of the USDA already nailed the final nail in the coffin of American dog breeders last year.  I wrote about that here and here.  This new news from PIJAC is simply dancing on their graves.  ASPCA/HSUS, et al., do not believe that anyone has the right to breed pets.  Anyone.  They don't care about "standards."  They just use the issue of standards to put as many more breeders out of business as they can.  America is awash in "standards" everywhere and so many dog breeders have already been put out of business that many of America's puppies are now foreign bred.  That's right, the government regulated dog breeding so much that its been outsourced!  If if this is all just too much for you think of it this way.  The Purdue study backed by PIJAC is a study on "dog breeder standards" by people who don't breed dogs.

Some of the rest of us have seen the PIJAC writing on the wall for a long time now.  The evidence was clear that PIJAC was being infiltrated from within by animal rights extremists.  For information on their backstabbing in California, see this excellent blog and her follow up piece.  In California, it is now a crime of "animal cruelty" to sell an animal in a public place.  Any animal.  

Back in 2009, the American Pet Products Association pulled all of it's funding from PIJAC stating that it had been concerned about its leadership and sustainability as an organization for several years.  APPA stated it's goal was to ensure that America continues to have live animals available for sale.  That tells me that they had concerns that PIJAC no longer supported the sales of pet animals.  

Oh but Sayres, has fallen on his sword and declared that in the past, he was simply, mistaken.   Time will tell if the pet world has been had yet again, or if Sayres is simply available for sale to the highest bidder.  I for one, am not holding my breath.