Update to Our Stolen Pet Food Safety Laws

AAFCO didn’t respond, AFIA didn’t respond, and FDA’s response appears to blame AAFCO.

In late January 2021 we provided pet owners Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) acquired emails evidencing that FDA, AAFCO and an industry trade association lobbied Congress to delete pet food safety laws promised to pet owners in 2007.

Questions were sent to all three organizations asking them to explain to pet owners why they acted to delete pet food safety laws promised to us. AAFCO did not respond, two requests. AFIA (American Feed Industry Association) did not respond, two requests.

With the FDA, on 1/31/21 I sent the FDA this question:

“FOIA acquired emails have been provided to us evidencing Dr. Dave Edwards worked with the AAFCO Board of Directors and AFIA to influence a language change in S2434 in 2018. That language change deleted pet food safety laws Ensuring the Safety of Pet Food section (a) promised to pet owners in 2007. This email is requesting FDA to provide pet owners an explanation as to why your agency participated in the language change of a bill that deleted laws promised to pet owners.“

After a second request was sent to FDA on 2/8/21, the FDA responded 2/25/21 with:

“Dear Ms. Thixton,

The AAFCO rule change you cite is consistent with a statutory change Congress enacted and the President signed into law in 2018.  We are attaching a previous response we sent to you regarding this statutory change.  

Sincerely,

AskCVM”

FDA termed it “The AAFCO rule change…” Because the laws (rules) deleted were federal laws – not AAFCO rules/regulations, the only way to interpret what FDA is saying here is AAFCO is the responsible party for deleting our laws. FDA appears to be trying to remove themselves from responsibility with this response by insinuating AAFCO is the only agency to blame. Why would FDA throw AAFCO under the bus?

We have email evidence that FDA played a role in this along with AAFCO and AFIA. Perhaps FDA CVM can feel better about themselves by blaming AAFCO (it doesn’t help pet owners however).

And the “previous response” FDA references, that was NOT what we asked for either. It was an explanation of how the bill moved through Congress (not worth repeating here).

FDA’s Dr. Dave Edwards, AAFCO Board of Directors Sue Hays, Stan Cook, Richard TenEyck, Bob Geiger, Ali Kashani, Ken Bowers, and AFIA representative Leah Wilkinson all took direct action to influence a change to a bill that deleted pet food safety laws promised to pet owners. The VERY LEAST they can do is provide pet owners an explanation to why they did it.

Instead, pet owners got less than ‘the very least’ from AAFCO and AFIA (absolutely nothing), and we got a little bit of finger pointing by FDA (also nothing).

Wishing you and your pet(s) the best,

Susan Thixton
Pet Food Safety Advocate
Author Buyer Beware, Co-Author Dinner PAWsible
TruthaboutPetFood.com
Association for Truth in Pet Food

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The 2021 List
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