Zeldin to pursue new ban on animal testing at EPA

Administrator Lee Zeldin plans to revive a ban on animal testing at the Environmental Protection Agency, The Washington Times has learned.

The EPA had pursued a phaseout of animal testing during the first Trump administration, but the Biden administration erased the deadlines, effectively neutering the policy.

Now Mr. Zeldin plans to put it back in place.

“Under President Trump’s first term, EPA signed a directive to prioritize efforts to reduce animal testing and committed to reducing testing on mammals by 30 percent by 2025 and to eliminate it completely by 2035. The Biden Administration halted progress on these efforts by delaying compliance deadlines. Administrator Zeldin is wholly committed to getting the agency back on track to eliminating animal testing,” Molly Vaseliou, an agency spokesperson, told The Times.

EPA uses animal testing to help determine toxicity levels of exposure to pesticides and chemicals, using tens of thousands of vertebrate animals a year. The goal is to determine the chemicals’ likely effects on humans.

The agency does some of the testing at its own lab in North Carolina.

Andrew Wheeler, the agency’s head at the end of the first Trump term, had called for a 30% reduction in mammal testing by 2025 and a complete end by 2035. He also ordered retirement plans to be put in place for some of the test animals, such as rabbits.

The Biden administration scrapped the goals, saying they had become a needless point of contention. They also ditched retirement plans for rabbits kept at the North Carolina lab.

The Times, using data from the White Coat Waste Project, reported in 2023 that scientists euthanized a rabbit rather than give him a retirement, saying it was too much of a burden to give him the socialization a bunny would need to be healthy. 

The EPA did not say what its new plans are for retiring the animals.

But the Kindness Ranch, an animal sanctuary, said it’s ready to take animals if the EPA will turn them over.

“As we’ve previously offered to the EPA and other federal agencies, the nonprofit Kindness Ranch animal sanctuary is ready, willing, and able to take in, rehabilitate and re-home rabbits and other animals at no expense to taxpayers, as we’ve successfully done for thousands of dogs, cats, and other former lab animals,” said John Ramer, the ranch’s executive director. “Just say when and we’ll be there.”

Alternatives to animal testing, generally groups under the moniker New Approach Methods, have been growing and even under President Biden, the EPA expanded their use.

Some scientists argue that NAMs are too far from being a credible reality to pursue a phaseout of actual animal testing. Other scientists say having a deadline is the only way to prod the kind of developments that will result in an animal testing-free situation.

The White Coat Waste Project, which pushes to end taxpayer funding of animal testing, said Mr. Zeldin’s revival of the Trump ban is the right call.

“We’re grateful to Administrator Zeldin for committing to clean up the Biden EPA’s disastrous waste by reinstating the Trump plan to eliminate animal testing,” said Justin Goodman, senior vice president at White Coat. 

“Trump’s decision is great news for taxpayers and pet owners as it sends a message to big spending animal abusers across the federal government: Stop the money. Stop the madness!” he said.

He said EPA’s chemical safety experiments include forcing animals to inhale wildfire smoke and emissions from firearms and compelling companies “to poison puppies with pesticides.”

Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, a New York Republican who has been prodding the EPA to revive the phaseout, also cheered Mr. Zeldin’s move.

“Reinstating the Trump EPA plan will save tens of millions of taxpayer dollars and spare countless dogs, rabbits and other animals from painful and unnecessary experiments that can be replaced with modern alternatives that are more effective than antiquated animal testing methods,” she said.

Mr. Zeldin, a former member of Congress, had a long history of supporting pro-animal legislation.

He was a cosponsor of bills to stop experiments on dogs at the Veterans Affairs Department and to phase out animal testing for cosmetics.

He also backed bills to forbid buying or selling shark fins, to create a federal crime for producing or distributing animal cruelty videos, and to ban both horse slaughter and the export of horses if intended for human consumption.