It's Maria's MutS and Stuff.
What a great idea on iHeartRadio.
Welcome to Maria's Mutts and Stuff and with me.
You know, it's always one of my favorites when somebody is a return guest, and he's also one of my favorite people. It is undercover animal investigator Pete Paxton.
So Pete, welcome back.
Thank you so much for having me.
It is a real honor to be here.
Please, you are, like I said, all these years, big fan of yours. You know that once we got connected, and you always fill me in on stuff that really makes my head spin. But it's just very, very important in the animal rights animal welfare field. For anybody who's listening to this podcast, obviously they're into it just like we are. But you're the real deal, and you know your thumb is on the pulse of it, So tell me what's been going on.
Also, by the fact, by the way, I looked it up because I was.
Trying to remember the last time we spoke, and it was actually not too long ago.
It was this year. It was I believe in February. We had a chat. Okay, yeah, with that was so tell.
Me things move so fast. So yes, Okay, we got something new, okay, And and and that's the thing is like it is, it's difficult in the animal rights space now to present something that is new to people because it seems like we know everything. But what we did on this is that my group Seed, Kaelin and I Run we uncovered something that we all thought we knew about. Turns out it's not at all what we thought. And it is livestock auctions, which so yes, livestock auctions are
a much bigger people. So so, first of all, for your listeners who had don't know anything about that. And if you're thinking of an auction and you're imagining some guy in a cowboy hat sitting up on a podium and just like rambling really fast to sell animals, boom, you nailed it. That's exactly what it is, right, and it is there's about there's about a thousand of them, over a thousand.
Over a thousand auctions auction.
Over a thousand stock auctions, okay, all over the US. Okay, and you're a big deal in rural America. And you might not think it, but they are connected to to.
If you eat okay, like if.
You eat beef and it's to a lecture degree, it would be. And I can discuss this to alextra grief poultry and pork. But if you eat beef or or lamb or goat, odds are that animal went through an auction at some point.
Really and okay, so let me just interrupt you.
So most people like I don't know because I don't eat meat, but but I still pay attention to it. So most people assume that the steak they're buying in the supermarket came from a cattle farm or something like a beef farm in the Midwest.
Is that correct?
Yeah? And it and it did. But so here's here's the thing. Is that is that eighty percent of cattle producers rely on auctions and get their cattle to market. In fact, there's been more sheep sales sheep and lamb sales in auctions than there are sheep and lambs because most of them get sold more than once.
Oh my, okay, so how does that happen? Explain that to me.
So here we go. We got a real brief history lessons. Okay, right, is that is that a long time ago you had a bunch of cows, right and and and way back when we used to. We primarily used cattle like their highs fat their tower, right, Okay, but we start but once we had railroads and you could move stuff really easily, we were the beef industry was picking up, and we're like, you know what, we can fatten these cattle up up, we can eat them, and we now have a way
to get them to market. So like if you can go on Google Maps and you just just randomly go somewhere in the US and put in livestock auction odds are the auction that comes up, you're gonna see a railroad going by it. Because the animals literally were put onto train cars to get them to a slaughterhouse. Okay, then yeah, n K eighteen wheelers, right, And so the thing is it's never changed. It's like you have. Auctions
are places. We typically think of auctions as places where it's like the small independent, rural family farm sells their animals, and they do, and then we think other small independent farms like I'm gonna buy this one cow or kill. On the JBS website they say that a one year that they bought from over thirty one thousand, one hundred family owned farms. Auctions are how they can make that claim. Wow, It's like it's not just small places buying JBS, car
deal cabinets, beef factors, all the big names. And so you have like you have like people who have factory full on factory farms that are selling, and then you
have people that they just got you goats, right. I remember I remember seeing some a guy come here and say his son was really upset, but he goats because they were pets that he raised, or they have just a couple of cows, or one woman she brought in this goat with a with on a leash collar, and she took the leash off and she kissed that goat on and scare the animals depends on an auction. I'll explain that.
Okay, wait, wait, let me just tell you.
You cut out for sex, So tell me I And so I got that she brought the goat, she took the leash off, and watch she kissed the goat on the head and then she brought it in.
Yeah, she kissed the goat on the head and then she gave me the goat. And normally you have to scare animals to a pin, right, right, And I can't explain that this goat followed me into a pin. It's was like a pet. But once that goat was done going through auction, that gun was that goat was running
just like all of the others. So even the loved ones, even the like even the small independent family farm, and they actually care about their animals, those animals are not exempted from cruelty, and livestock auctions are the reason why. So the way it works is that in the in the commercial animal space where people are making off animals, the rule of thumb is the less interaction with the animals, the more neglect there's gonna be bink broiler farm, egg farm. Right.
The more you've been interaction, the more violence and at auctions you have constant you interactions. So what I did is I went under cover seventeen livestock auctions across the US. I worked undercover at fifteen of them. And this was in ten states. This is Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa, Pennsylvania, New York, California, Florida, and Louisian, Okay. And that the video is on. We have a site it's our seed Livestock Auctions dot org. If you put if you google seed livestock auctions.
Then you'll see it come up, right, and that's s E A D. I should also let people know in case they're not sure, SEED stands for Strategies for Ethical and Environmental Development. So that's I just want to get that off there, right, so when they're wondering how it's spelled, it's like, that's what it represents, and it's s E ED Okay, sorry, yeah.
Oh no, you're good. Yeah, thank you, thank you so and and you can see online what we got and it's bad. I mean it's if Vox did a story they came out with the exclusive. It it hit Apple News top stories and uh you know, so you can you know, a major news network. This is not your stuff saying.
This, you know right right right.
It was really horrendous stuff. And what and what you see is that it's not just like like the workers are extreme. It's this crazy pace you have to work sometimes with dangerous animals because he's animal scared at him.
Of course, of course animals are smart.
They yeah, insact, there's the animals are so overworked and scared. I saw healthy calves like you know, like three six months old, just fall down and just die.
Oh god, oh, like a heart attack or something or a stroke. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The dehydration street and and and so you know, it's it's it's it's a very dangerous, tough environment and people have an insane pace to work at and they quickly resort to violence. And so you know, you have you have on the one side, you have that, and on the other side you have these other kinds of auctions that more resemble wet markets. And it's like it's like, you know, chickens and turkeys and ducks and rabbits being
sold alongside goats and hogs. And it's an environment that is so ripe for zoonotic disease that there's a study that Harvard and NYU recently did where about zoonotic disease outbreaks and an entire section of it is dedicated to live stock auctions.
Wow wow.
Yeah, So that is that is basically where we're at. Is that is that we did this very thorough investigation to show Look, it's not one bad actor, it's across the whole country. It's all of them. And this end you know, if you eat meat, odds are you know a livestock auction was involved.
Wow? Wow? Okay, So I have a couple of questions for you.
So for those so, now, wet markets, for those who are like, wait what that was a very well we all thought or think that that's where COVID came from, right, it was the wet markets in China way back. Explain what a wet market is now, you said chicken turkeys, are they alive or.
No, they're alive. They're alive at wet markets.
Okay, yeah, So wet markets typically that you have live animals that are sold. Sometimes you butcher them on site.
Okay, yeah, and so and this is this is.
A major US you know you have this. You know, I've seen them in Chicago and LA and New York. You know, it's that a lot of people think like, oh, that's something somewhere else, right, and they associated with COVID like yeah, yeah, it's like man, you know, it's here, Yeah, it's yeah, it's it's here. Yeah, it's and you know, and there's all kinds of like and it doesn't it's not just like it's not just like it's some kind of you know, you know, weird animals.
It's stuff that people eat.
Right.
So now, absolutely, and you know you're everyone, And not to be funny, but you're we're hearing this from the who's mouth meaning you because you're undercover, right, so you saw this with your own eyes and shot videos And so how is that? I mean, because I know we've talked about it before. How how are you not recognized? And I know these are you know, it's a big, huge country. Like how do you get yourself into these situations with not giving without giving up too much information?
But how do you get in so that people believe that you want to be a worker in one of these live auctions?
Right? So still for for e listeners that don't know, you know, my job is doing surveillance and undercover right, commercial animal facilities? Right? And and for this I understand, like, I like, it would be so cool to make myself sound like I'm James Bond on this, But it was really easy.
Okay, really, I can't imagine. I can't imagine.
I mean, yeah, almost any place I would show up to the day before or the day of and I would be like, hey, do you need someone I'm not drunk right now, and they'd be like, please work for us, right, because so many people were drunk while while doing this I mean there were there were there were people that were like they were I saw I saw like more
than once. I saw a drunk, drunk guy with a kid who was under ten years old getting their kid to chase after and animals or to like try to stand out of the way as a dangerous bull was charging. Oh yeah, I mean it's you know, the wild West is like there's nothing that terms, nothing to explain what these places are like. Yeah, and so you know, it's, uh, it was it was easy as long as they like, you know, some of them, it's all over the place.
Some of them had had people who had been around livestock their whole lives, and they wanted people who knew what they're doing. But again, fifty to fifty shops, they're going to be drunk while they're doing it. Wow, some of them it was like a bunch of high school kids.
A lot of them were also drunk. Right. But the thing is is that it's like they wanted someone in either environment who knew what they're doing, so they might at first watch me and it's this is gonna sound silly, but they want to make sure I know how to boom around animals, right, and that I know how to open and close gates. Okay, that's it's actually it is very simple. But if you've never done it, you can tell immediately someone has no idea, what the hell of course?
And sure, yeah, and I've worked under covered enough ranches and farms and slaughterhouses.
Like sure, yeah, you know that's not silly at all. That's I mean. I couldn't go in and do it.
I'd be like, h yeah, I've never did this before, and they'd be like, yes, we know, go you know so I mean, yeah, it's not silly at all.
Yeah, and so and so, you know, that's that's all that they needed. And then once people could see that I did, in fact know what I was doing, you know, that kind of that helped because at some places it was at some places they were so rigid and tight about you stand here, don't she move, And at other places it was it was more like I know what I'm doing, and they can tell I know what I'm doing, and that enabled me to move from spot to spot.
If I saw a problem elsewhere, I'd be like, I know how to take care of this, and then I could just kind of get over there and film what needed film. No one questioned it because right, yeah, Pete knows what he's doing.
We believe it, you know, right right right?
Yeah? And uh, and so it was easy. It was you know, some places they didn't need someone that but it was very easy to get hired. Right.
Okay, So all of the videos and the photos and everything that you shot, now, the people, the places that you shot it, I mean, do they have uh and this might be a stupid question, but do they have employees who actually search website social media, like not focus groups, but groups that might be onto them or they don't care because they're so arrogant.
Yeah, so they you know, the I do, and I kind of I went out of my way to hit I hit big and small targets because I wanted to show this is all of the place. But I made sure I was hitting targets that I thought weren't going to be onto me. Got it, Yeah, And but that was I mean, there was a lot sure to pick from.
But I mean, yeah, you know, there were there were people that were there were people that were scrolling on social media on their phones while working, and that resulted more than one animals running by them and not in the correct pen and creating a lot of problems.
Wow.
Yeah. But but the thing is is that if you go online and you look at this case, you if you ever wonder like like how much is this you know, stuff the animal right back to the city. It's true. What is it like if you want to see a slice out of rural American life where everyone everyone comes together, because like these livestock auctions, it's almost like a church for them, right, everyone comes together. It's a social time. People that live on farms in the middle of nowhere.
Once a week they got this chance to come together, and then some of them dress up for it.
Right, It's really.
Wow. It's like if you combine the movie Deliverance with an episode of Real Housewives, get right, and you will see it like you will see yeah, you will see like like you know, all these kinds of people of all ages and what their behavior is. And then one thing we did on the website was that normally when there's a case, a lot of animal rights groups do a thing where it's that that you want to get
someone's attention. So you take one animal and you're like, Okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna try to humanize this one animal. So that you can not just see this as a whole bunch of birds, but like one chicken out of the flock. And this is Lucy and this is her story. But what we did was we decided we're gonna try and humanize the workers. And I took three employees and I gave them ail busines. And these three employees committed abusive acts, acts that when you see them, you're going
to be like, I'm pissed off. I want that person to going to jail. But I tell you on the website what was happening that day. I tell you there's no excuse for what they did, but I tell you exactly why they did what they did, so that you can sit back, take a breath and say, Okay, I can see how a good person can do a bad thing.
Sure, it's almost like it's almost like peer pressure for them.
Correct, Oh very much. So, yeah, peer pressure. You know, you're stressed, you're dehydrated, someone screaming at you. You know, sure, you get brutal to get the job done.
Right, and it's a job, so you know, people need jobs, so it kind of makes you feel you're right, like not like, oh, arrest these people, but you kind of have empathy for them because they're just trying to make a do their job, but at the expense and you know, and being and brutalizing animals.
Yeah, yeah, they got they got this rare thing. Live stack auctions have a very unique thing I've never seen in any other kind of job, which is like imagine, okay for anyone who does it, now I can back
up here is it? What to do at the auction is you have people that they come in and they bring their animals, and you have trailers coming in, right and these trailers might literally have one animal, one sheep, one goat, one cow or a hog or or you know, someone might have like so many animals crammed into the trailer. I've seen this that you yank the doors open and animals literally come spilling out, and some of them have
trampled each other to death. It's like it is, yeah, I mean everything in between right right then, you know, the animals are going through the auction, and then the public is going through and you have people that you have small time buyers and they're walking through and they're looking at the pens like, oh I want to I want to try and buy, you know, that pig. I
want to buy that goat. And then you have big time buyers, people the places like JBS and car You'll send out and they're looking and they're like, Okay, I'm gonna buy all this stuff right right, and they're all watching, and then everybody comes through and they picks up their animals. So it's like, while you're working at the auction, literally half the town is there, sure their kids watching you, right, And it does not deter the abuse. In fact, some
of the customers become involved in the abuse. You'll see that in the footage that we have. Yeah, it's and so it's this weird thing where it's like, imagine that pure pressure. Imagine it's like your family is like, we're so proud of you, Maria that you're gonna go work at the auction, your first job you're in high school. We're so proud you're gonna you've been helping us here at the farm, but you're gonna go out there and
do a good job. And then your neighbors are watching you and they're like, Maria, hurry the hell up, just throw.
That goat, right, And so you do it because everybody's watching and you have the pressure and you're trying to do a job, but at the expense of the animal.
Ugh.
And so that's something that was unique about this case was getting to say you get to like really see not just oh, there's a crime against animals and that's bad.
You get to see the the you know how on a cultural level. It takes place, right and you know it. It's what's what's difficult about it is it leaves you without much space other than promoting a plant based diet. Right, have a solution because you're talking about culture.
Right right, because I was, Yeah, I was just going to ask you.
So by you know, going undercover and exposing the cruelty and everything else, the goal is to get people to not eat so much meat because then these livestock auctions wouldn't be necessary.
Exactly exactly because you have things that are like you have you have laws and you have regulations. And now for this next part, I don't I don't want to try and be too graphic, but I might have to describe some Okay, Okay, so I'm gonna try it. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna be too graphic that okay, Okay, all right, don't worry listeners. Okay, yeah, I'll just sorry.
I mean to laugh when you say that, but you just make me laugh now, No, no, don't worry, listeners, vomit.
You're not gonna cry. You're not gonna cry.
Now, I'm gonna cry. Listen to you, but go ahead.
Okay. Well, I'll just say that there was like at one place people abused from downed animals, I'll just say that, okay, And they did it and in front of signs that said, you know, USDA regulations prohibit downed animals being unloaded at the facility, and I got a shot of that while I filmed a downed animal being beaten and unloaded. And that same the same place as Empire, Lifestock and Fort
in New York. They host events at Corno University that for the beat Quality Assurance Program, and that program is designed to have standards that prohibits abuse such as beating animals of solid objects, which they did, shocking down animals which they did, you know, trying to move down in which they did. So it's like that doesn't do anything. Now when it comes to the laws, there's laws on the books everywhere. But some of the abuse that I saw,
which I I won't describe. You'd have to go on the website because I don't want to make I don't want to know people too much, right right, Yeah, but some of the abuse that I saw that was reported to law enforcement, it's like what some people got away with that they weren't prosecuted for. It leaves it has left me, after twenty three years of doing this job, thinking, I guess I don't even know what animal cruelty is anymore.
Oh, you know, it's awful like that if if that's legal that, but it's possibly.
Illy, right, and so you know, it's like you see this and you're like, okay, we're up against the entire culture, and this is an element that you know, even if someone's like I take care of my animals, you probably sell them to auction where they're abused. And the knee jerk reaction from the public right is going to be like, well, it packs a law. There's already laws, you know, have regulations, there's already regulations. You know, there's already third parties, right.
Like it doesn't matter. It seems like it doesn't matter.
And like the fact that you said that all this was happening, you know, in front of a sign that says USDA like who cares? Basically, yeah, like those are ineffective. It's ineffective to have something like that.
Yeah yeah, And so you know this, this is why, uh you know, animal rights groups were always trying to say, hey, if you can eat less meat, you're really going to be helping out the animals. And it's it's the truth. It's it's because I feel like we're in this age now where if it's like apathy is a virtue, right, or we're like, ah, you know what, I don't I can't get everything I want from this candidate, So I'm going to make a statement by.
Not voting right.
Right, It's like you're not making a statement doing the opposite.
Yeah yeah, yeah, I hear.
That, yeah, or or or people that are like, you know what, I'm I don't want to have to have responsibility for this. The corporations are the ones who should take responsibility. So therefore I'm not going to do anything right right, And it's it's apathy disguised as virtue. It sucks that we are the ones who have to take it upon ourselves to do the right thing. But I just want to remind people that like these animals, they're defenseless,
they're voiceless, and there's nothing that they can do. And you know, yeah, you don't. You don't have to hate the people involved with this. You don't have to hate the culture that engages in this. You still have the powers stop it.
Correct, correct, And I know that's yeah, no, that's your message. And honestly, and you know, for those because there are always people and I get it.
Who just I mean, I have friends and I'm sure you do.
Two peete who cannot wrap their head around never eating meat again like a plant based all the time. I just I cannot do it. Okay, it's not maybe you can't. But even if you eat less meat, I don't think and I just think as humans, it's not necessary to have meat three times a day, seven days a week. I don't think that's healthy for us, right, But there
are people who find that in their diet. So I mean my thought is always to say, Okay, well, I don't expect you to do because for a person like that, it's extreme for them to go one hundred percent plant based. But if they can cut out some of the meat, that will actually help this industry to not exist as much and graduate, you know, gradually.
Does is that correct? Like does that make sense?
Yeah, it's you know, yeah, it's it's it's going to take time for these things to change because it's a cultural thing, right And but yeah, you're right. I mean we all have the power, right, you know, to do something. And no, yeah, don't don't don't get frustrated.
Yeah, don't get frustrated.
And I think and I talked about this recently with another guest, I mean, I think compared to like plant based options from years and years ago, it's a very
it's a big difference than it was. So it's there are more options for people who maybe have considered it, or you know, people as they age and especially you know Americans gain weight and are unhealthy, and I know plenty as they get into their older ages older age without being specific in the age, but you know, over fifty, and it's like okay, either go you know, you are a heart attack waiting to happen, or change your diet.
And that's part of eating less meat is change your diet because one hundred percent of the cases when you hear about that, people change their diet. And that is definitely eating less meat their health changes and they get healthier and they're not a step away.
From a heart attack anymore.
Exactly.
It's kind of simple.
And it's not being on medications your whole life either, because that's not healthy as well. So yeah, yeah, I mean, I don't think we're talking about stuff that's really impossible. It's just it does sound extreme, but it's really not because we all really need to you know, we're given one body. You need to take care of it, and we all hope to live as long as we can.
But you know, eating meat three times a day, seven days a week, it's not going to get you to the ripe old age that your grandpa lived to.
I don't think, yeah, you know what I mean.
Yeah, yeah, I mean it's and the amount of stuff that's out there now is like there's some really good stuff.
Oh my goodness. Absolutely, it's it's easy easy now.
Where it can be tough is in if you if you're out in just rural areas that that can be that can be kind of tough. Sure, Fortunately Burger King has got the impossible whopper going on, that's right.
But but besides that, you know, I mean, especially.
In major urban areas, it's very very simple. But I mean that you know that that goes that goes back to culture as well. I mean if I can't, Yeah, I mean, it's it's, you know, we have to recognize that there's people in rural America that like they they they see you know. It's it's kind of like, you know, we, especially in this day and age, we you know, politically culturally, we see each other as a threat, right, and we got to call each other out when there's problems and
say we got to make changes. And I believe moving to a plant based diet is necessary, saving the environment, helping animals. You know, we just and we don't have to like hate each other in the process correct of doing it.
Correct because we're all you know, we always say we all belied the same color. We're all exactly alike inside. So like get over yourself absolutely, you know what I mean. It's like it's really simple, just get over it.
So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I mean it's really very simple. You know, if I cut you or I cut someone else, we're all going to bleed the same, you know.
So yeah, yeah.
Well this is this is like I mean, it's it's this heavy duty stuff beat and you always come back with stuff like this. But I think it's really important because we all need our eyes to be open to things, because too many people also like to just put their head in the sand and not see what reality is. So, you know, thanks to people like you going undercover in these like heinous conditions and situations to bring to light for us.
So you know, kudos to you, and if if I appreciate that, and if people like if you go to see livestock auctions dot org, like I say, you'll see it's not it's not just like a horrible video of a bunch of cruelty, right, like you'll see. We have we have different paths. We have like we have like what are livestock auctions? We explain it. We have a reasons for Abuse tub and that explains why exactly good people do bad things. We have stories of these other workers.
And then uh, you know, we also have we have the evidence tab where this the evidence tab is the one tab. But I'm gonna tell you I worked hard on it.
Evidence.
Okay, that's the one that's got the stuff. If you're like, you know what, I don't know. I think this guy P is exaggerating well to the evidence yeah, that's that's the one where we have additional videos. But if you think we only chose the worst of for the main vid, the rest of it's right there, right yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
All right, well okay, So seed livestock Auctions dot org. So if they need more information, if they want to see the evidence because they don't believe what we're talking about, so have Yeah.
Just we also have stuff on there that would be like as a reference if someone's like, hey, I do not want to see those videos, but where the hell are you getting this infol We have links to everything that Harvard and why you study.
Oh that's great.
Yeah, this information about like eighty percent of cattle producers send their cattle to market. Like where did they get that from? Links to it, alost to it.
Okay, So it's all there, okay. And also, I mean you guys are a nonprofit, correct.
We are a nonprofit and the other half of our work is working with litigators to sue factory farms that pollute waterways. People can donate and the money goes to finding animal coolly and protecting the environment.
Right, which I remember when you you were on earlier this year.
So okay, So yeah, So for those who are listening and you want to do something and you go.
For those who say, well, first of all for those who.
They are called to action, would be just please you know, as we get into a new year, try to eat less meat because it would be best. It's best for the environment, it's best for your health. You know, you don't have to go cold turkey, no offense or not to be funny using the turkey, but you know, if you could do a gradual that would be a big help on both for your own life and for the environment. But as well as you know, Pete does all this amazing work that we need people to do and survives
by donations at Seed Livestock Auctions dot org. This, I know is a was a big thing that you just you know, underwent what's next for you because I know you always have something going on.
Oh, we have a lot of it. So we do have several places Seeds involved with it, UH and UH and suing for polluting the environment. As far as anything else, all I can say is we have things underway.
Okay, I can't I can't give you can't no, I know you can never And I get that, all right, I get it.
But and yeah, as far as any anyone at any targets out there that are nervous, Hey, if you're not breaking the law, you've got nothing to worry about the law.
So I love it. I love it. It's awesome. No, it's true.
And I know when your next thing, when you're ready to do it and disclose it, we'll be talking again here on Marias MutS and stuff.
Yeah.
Yeah, So, Pete Paxton, thank you so much as always for doing all that you do. Uh, you know, I love that we've become friends and you're always willing to share your experiences because you definitely you definitely you know. It's almost like when somebody is watching a scary movie and you have your eyes closed really tight. And what I love about you is you force people's eyes to be open and we need that, you know. Yeah, Pete Paxston, We're gonna definitely talk again. Thanks for all you do.
Keep keep fighting the good fight.
Likewise, thank you,