Trump EPA to Prioritize Banning Animal Testing

President Donald Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), under the direction of Administrator Lee Zeldin, is planning to roll back animal testing.

An agency spokesperson informed the Washington Times of this policy shift and noted that President Donald Trump made this a priority during his first term. However, the Biden administration halted progress on banning animal testing. Now, Trump’s EPA wants to get that original effort back on track.

“Under President Trump’s first term, EPA signed a directive to prioritize efforts to reduce animal testing and committed to reducing testing on mammals by 30% by 2025 and to eliminate it completely by 2035,” agency spokesperson Molly Vaseliou told the outlet.

“The Biden administration halted progress on these efforts by delaying compliance deadlines. Administrator Zeldin is wholly committed to getting the agency back on track to eliminating animal testing,” she added.

The taxpayer watchdog White Coat Waste Project (WCW) — which has blown the lid off of cruel animal experiments conducted with taxpayer funds throughout the years — is praising the EPA’s renewed effort.

“The Biden EPA completely canceled the plan put in place by the Trump administration to end animal testing at the EPA & they started funding wasteful experiments like forcing animals to breathe handgun & rifle smoke for gun control experiments,” WCW Senior VP Justin Goodman said in a statement.

WCW provided further perspective on the policy implications, noting that Zeldin is actively taking steps to “save puppies from being poisoned with pesticides and tens of thousands of other animals from being made obese, electroshocked, stressed, and forced to inhale simulated wildfire smoke and emissions from rifles and handguns.”

Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY) has also been pushing for the EPA to ban animal testing.

“Reinstating the Trump EPA plan will save tens of millions of taxpayer dollars and spare countless dogs, rabbits, and other animals from painful and unnecessary experiments that can be replaced with modern alternatives that are more effective than antiquated animal testing methods,” she said, according to the Times.

This coincides with another huge win for taxpayers, as the FDA is moving to phase out some of its animal testing.

“BIG WIN: I’ve long pushed to end unnecessary and cruel animal testing, and I applaud the FDA’s decision to phase it out in favor of safer and more reliable modern alternatives,” Malliotakis wrote.