mr. chairman , i thank the chairman for the time . 
i want to respond to a few of the remarks made by the gentleman from kentucky and the gentleman from new york . 
first of all , he talked about an inconsistent policy because we do not allow horses to be shipped overseas for slaughter purposes by boat . 
we do nothing to stop that from being done with regard to transport to canada or mexico . 
the fact of the matter is this amendment does not stop it . 
so when my colleagues talk about the humane treatment of horses , this amendment is going to result in more inhumane treatment of horses if that is their guide , because they are going to be shipped greater distances to canada and mexico because they can not be sent to slaughter facilities in the u.s. second , the gentleman from new york makes reference to the great racehorse ferdinand , like this amendment would have stopped ferdinand from having gone to slaughter . 
it absolutely would not have . 
i did not like seeing ferdinand go to slaughter , but ferdinand was sold to a japanese owner and exported not for slaughter purposes but for breeding purposes ; and later on in japan , he was slaughtered . 
this amendment will do absolutely nothing to stop that same situation from happening to any other racehorse in the world . 
thirdly , the gentleman makes references to just three slaughter facilities . 
that is not true either . 
there are other slaughter facilities for horses . 
for example , there is a slaughterhouse in nebraska which solely slaughters horses for zoos and sanctuaries for big cats which would be essentially shut down by this amendment because horses provide the proper type of high protein diet for those animals , when they are not out racing across the savannahs , because beef simply is not good for cats , these large cats . 
the gentleman from new york says it is budget neutral , but the fact of the matter is all he is talking about there is budget neutral in terms of this particular amendment not costing any money ; but consequences of the amendment will cost a lot of money because this amendment does absolutely nothing to stop the many practices that occur in this country that create unwanted horses , everything from nurse mares in the thoroughbred racing industry , to premarin mares to produce the drug premarin , to the foals of those mares , to the fact that for every smarty jones that is created , there are hundreds and hundreds of unwanted racehorses who do not make the grade and other horses that are unsuitable for riding and other pleasure purposes or showing . 
those horses , as well , will fall into that category of unwanted horses . 
nor does the amendment do anything to take care of all those unwanted horses as they start to accumulate in our society . 
we have already talked about the massive estimated costs that will take place as a result of that . 
finally , the gentleman from kentucky talks about the facilities that exist that would take care of horses , and we have some of those facilities in the country today . 
this amendment does not establish standards of care that horse rescue facilities must meet . 
the humane society of the united states , which supports the amendment , admits that equine shelters are less well-established than cat and dog shelters . 
citing extreme costs and staff time needed to shelter horses , the humane society warned of needing to be aware of distinctions between sheltering horses and sheltering other companion animals . 
current horse-rescue facilities are overwhelmed with the amount of horses they already care for without this amendment being in effect and are in desperate search of additional funding . 
the american association of equine practitioners estimated that in the first year alone of a slaughter ban 2 , 700 additional equine facilities would be needed to keep up with unwanted horses displaced by the ban , compounding the problem by adding additional facilities that will also be searching for additional funding . 
this is a bad , bad idea . 
i know there is a lot of emotion that says this is a great thing to do . 
it is not and it is not in the best interests of the horses of this country to pass this amendment . 
i urge my colleagues to oppose it . 
