Lola & Emmy
We saved Lola and Emmy from a kill pen, where they were slated to ship to slaughter within days with other very young mustangs. We worked with others to get all these babies out and bailed Lola and Emmy, along with Sunny and Birch. The mares don't need sanctuary, so we did not raise funds for them to come to Skydog, but we promise we will do all we can to find them the best landing. We are very hopeful to place them with a great rescue that will gentle them for life in a perfect forever home. We will follow up with them to be sure they are safe and loved for the rest of their lives.
Lola is a sorrel with a flaxen mane. Her tail is still short as she is a baby. Born in 2024, she was rounded up last October from Twin Peaks, California. On 22 July 2025, she was still in a BLM corral. Over the weekend of 15 August, she was sold Sale Authority for $25 at an adoption event in Kellyville, Oklahoma. A couple days later, she was in a kill pen in Texas. Lola is only one year old‼️
Emmy, a beautiful bay, was born in 2022 in Twin Peaks, California. That same year, she survived a roundup when she was tiny‼️ She was sold Sale Authority for $25 at the same BLM adoption event, and hauled to the same kill pen by the same buyers as Lola and a group of young mustangs.
The BLM cannot legally sell wild horses and burros directly to slaughter. Until the SAFE Act is passed, there is nothing to stop private owners from doing so. So the agency sells federally protected animals cheap to middlemen, who make a profit flipping them for their meat price.
Starting in 2019, the BLM even paid these people $1000 per equine to take them off their hands via the Adoption Incentive Program (AIP). Since that corrupted program was overturned in District Court in March 2025, the bureau has been using Sale Authority to push as many horses and burros out of their corrals as possible.
Protections against sale and slaughter were part of the original Wild Free-Roaming Horse & Burro Act of 1971. These were gutted by the 2004 Burns Amendment, which created Sale Authority to get rid of “excess” animals. Wild equines 10+ years of age, or younger animals passed over for adoption 3 times, qualify to be sold for $25 or less. Ownership transfers immediately to the buyer, at which point all federal protections are removed and the BLM washes their hands of any responsibility for them.
A large family crime ring that repeatedly broke the law by selling Adoption Incentive Program (AIP) animals to slaughter is doing the same thing with Sale Authority. They purchased the trailer load of young mustangs in Kellyville and drove them straight to the kill pen in Texas to turn a profit. The BLM has ignored many complaints about this family, but we are going to report them on the ground and demand that they be prevented from buying or adopting horses.
This is a new low for the BLM. Funneling babies straight into the slaughter pipeline is light years away from their mandate. Felix (2), Elliot (4), Birch (3), Sunny (3), Lola (1), and Emmy (3) have sounded the alarm for what is happening to young mustangs at adoption events. We are going to gather evidence to stop it, just as we did for the AIP. We ask you to take a look at our Call to Action and share this information with others to raise awareness.
American Mustangs and Burros Need Your Help
In addition to supporting our work by donating, becoming a patron on Patreon, or sponsoring a Skydog, there are several important pieces of legislation to protect American equines currently moving through Congress. It only takes a few minutes to contact your Rep and two Senators to urge them to support these bills. You can Contact Members of Congress by calling the Capitol Switchboard (202) 224-3121, submitting contact forms on their individual websites, or sending one email to all three simultaneously at www.democracy.io
Save America’s Forgotten Equines (SAFE) Act of 2025 (H.R.1661 in the House and S.775 in the Senate). This bill would amend the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, commonly known as the “Farm Bill”. There are several important provisions for animals in that omnibus federal law, including the Cat and Dog Meat Trade Prohibition Act. It is currently illegal to slaughter, transport, possess, purchase, sell, or donate dogs and cats, or their parts, for human consumption. The SAFE Act would extend the ban to equines and shut down the slaughter pipeline that sends some 20,000 American horses and donkeys to savagely monstrous deaths in foreign slaughterhouses every year.
The Wild Horse & Burro Protection Act of 2023 (H. R. 4356) The bill would eliminate the use of helicopters in rounding up wild horses and burros, and require a study into alternative methods for humanely gathering the animals.
See our How to Help menu for other actions to ban zebra hunting at US canned hunt ranches and stop production of Premarin & other PMU drugs.
A bill from the previous 118th Congress that we hope will be introduced again this session:
Ejiao Act of 2023 (H.R. 6021). To ban the sale or transportation of ejiao, a gelatin made from boiling donkey skins, or products containing ejiao in interstate or foreign commerce, which brutally kills millions of donkeys primarily for beauty products and Chinese medicine.