The Animal Law Podcast

In this episode of The Animal Law Podcast, Mariann Sullivan speaks with Eric Glitzenstein, Director of Litigation at the Center for Biological Diversity, about what he calls the most extreme attack on the Endangered Species Act in its history. They break down two unprecedented actions by the Trump administration: the elimination of the long-standing regulatory definition of “harm” that protected endangered…

This month’s Animal Law Podcast features attorney Taj Uppal, who was arrested and charged with felony grand theft after rescuing two sick baby goats from Vera Goat Dairy, a California factory farm supplying Meyenberg Goat Milk to retailers like Whole Foods and Walmart. Uppal walks through the investigation that preceded the rescue, his arrest by Kings County Sheriff’s deputies, and the…

This week, Mariann Sullivan sits down with Cheryl Leahy, director of the newly launched Animal Law Practice Association (ALPA) at the Brooks Institute for Animal Rights Law and Policy, to unpack how the free program is training and connecting lawyers who want to build careers protecting animals. Cheryl explains ALPA’s two core pillars — a growing library of practical, topic-specific legal…

Animal law attorney and activist Wayne Hsiung joins host Mariann Sullivan along with attorneys Chris Carraway and Steffen Seitz of the University of Denver’s Animal Activist Legal Defense Project to break down the California Court of Appeals decision in Hsiung’s criminal case—a pivotal ruling that overturned two of three trespass convictions stemming from actions at Sunrise Farms and Reichardt Duck Farm,…

In this episode of the Animal Law Podcast, host Mariann Sullivan speaks with Amal Bouhabib, senior staff attorney at FarmSTAND, about a landmark federal lawsuit involving three young men from Guatemala who were recruited to the U.S. on J-1 cultural exchange visas and subjected to dangerous working conditions, fraudulent promises, substandard housing, and coercive threats at an industrial swine operation in…

In a landmark ruling, a federal court in the Northern District of California struck down four of six challenged Trump administration regulations that had significantly weakened the Endangered Species Act’s core enforcement mechanisms. Host Mariann Sullivan speaks with Noah Greenwald, Endangered Species Program Director at the Center for Biological Diversity, about the case — what was challenged, what the court decided,…

When Canadian animal rights lawyer and Animal Justice Executive Director Camille Labchuk discovered that a Manitoba horse exporter had shipped 97 horses to Japan in December 2022 — on a rerouted flight projected to exceed Canada’s 28-hour transport limit and without a legally required contingency plan covering the full journey — she did something almost unheard of in Canadian animal law:…

In this episode of the Animal Law Podcast, Mariann Sullivan sits down with Dr. Neil Dullaghan, political scientist and author of The Compassion Mandate: Remaking the European Union’s Leadership on Farmed Animal Welfare. Together, they explore the complexities and challenges of EU farmed animal policies. This episode explores: The historical progress and current state of farmed animal welfare in the EU.…

In this compelling episode, Mariann Sullivan interviews Wayne Hsiung and attorney Steffen Seitz about Wayne’s conviction following animal rescues at factory farms in California. The case hinges on several groundbreaking legal arguments, including the judge’s refusal to allow a necessity defense for rescuing suffering animals, constitutional concerns about the treatment of veganism as a belief system, and First Amendment implications for…

In a bold legal challenge that could redefine animal protection law, PETA is taking on the Maine Lobster Festival for steaming 16,000 lobsters alive on public parkland. The case hinges on Maine’s unique animal cruelty statute that protects “every living sentient creature” – a definition that evolves with scientific understanding. PETA’s Director of Litigation, Asher Smith, explains their creative approach using…

In this intellectually stimulating episode of the Animal Law Podcast, Mariann Sullivan speaks with constitutional law expert Michael Dorf about his innovative course “Animals and the Constitution.” Dorf shares how fundamental legal principles intersect with animal protection, revealing both the limitations and opportunities within our constitutional framework for advancing animal rights. This episode explores: Constitutional standing for animals: How courts determine…

Attorneys Will Lowrey (Animal Partisan) and Jessica Blome (Greenfire Law) join Mariann to discuss their battle to use California’s century-old animal protection laws to help dairy calves confined in tiny hutches. Despite having clear evidence that a dairy farm was violating Penal Code Section 597t by denying calves adequate exercise, they encountered a frustrating maze of procedural obstacles that prevented them…

In this thought-provoking episode of the Animal Law Podcast, we dive into a First Amendment case that cuts straight to the heart of animal advocacy: can the government prevent activists from showing the public what actually happens to animals in industrial agriculture? Mariann speaks with Sara Berinhout of FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression) and John Greil of the University…

This episode of the Animal Law Podcast features Christopher Berry, Executive Director of the Nonhuman Rights Project, discussing a groundbreaking court case that recognizes companion animals as family members in certain legal contexts. Mariann and Christopher explore how this New York decision challenges decades of precedent that treated beloved pets as mere property rather than family, potentially opening new doors for…

In this compelling episode, Mariann Sullivan speaks with Elise Bennett, Senior Attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, about the lawsuit challenging the controversial immigration detention facility in Florida’s Everglades. Bennett details how this hastily constructed center in Big Cypress National Preserve threatens endangered species, water quality, and the integrity of a crucial ecosystem that has received billions in restoration funding…

In a groundbreaking episode of The Animal Law Podcast, we explored radical new concepts that could fundamentally transform how constitutional law treats animals. Host Mariann Sullivan welcomed Cambridge University’s Raffael Fasel and Queen Mary University’s John Adenitire to discuss their book “Animals and the Constitution: Towards Sentience-Based Constitutionalism” – a work that challenges centuries of legal tradition by proposing constitutional frameworks…

In this episode of the Animal Law Podcast, Mariann Sullivan welcomes back Will Lowrey, legal counsel for Animal Partisan, alongside David Rosengard, managing attorney for the Animal Legal Defense Fund‘s Criminal Justice Program. They dive into an obscure but potentially game-changing legal tool: laws in certain states that allow private citizens to obtain search warrants when they have evidence of animal…

Alene Anello of Legal Impact for Chickens joins us once again, this time to talk, not about chickens, but about cows. Of course, the laws affecting farmed animals are often the same regardless of species and Legal Impact for Chickens thinks it would be great to see some of California’s rather good laws protecting farmed animals actually enforced. For that reason,…

FarmSTAND attorneys Kelsey Eberly and Skye Walker join us on this episode to discuss an absolutely infuriating case, Blumm v Northwest Natural Gas Company. They explain how an increasing number of dairy farms are more in the business of selling the methane being produced by their manure piles, or, as they call them, “lagoons,” than selling milk. Now, in Oregon, natural…

Edie Bowles, the Managing Director of UK law firm Advocates for Animals, joins us on this episode to help us understand what appears to be a groundbreaking decision in animal welfare law that involves one of the most widespread and egregious practices in industrial animal agriculture, the breeding of factory-farmed chickens raised for meat in ways that cause unbelievable suffering. At…