Animal Rights Protest Wisconsin

About 1,000 animal welfare protesters who tried to gain entry to a beagle breeding and research facility in Wisconsin have been turned back by police who fired rubber bullets and pepper spray into the crowd and arrested the group’s leader. It was the second attempt in as many months by protesters to take beagles from the Ridglan Farms facility in Blue Mounds, a small town about 25 miles southwest of the capital city of Madison. Dane County Sheriff Kalvin Barrett, in a video statement, said between 300 and 400 protesters were “violently trying to break into the property” and assault officers on Saturday.

Animal welfare activists converged outside of Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers’ Capitol office on Monday, chanting “Free the dogs!” and demanding that the governor and attorney general do what they can to shut down a beagle breeding and research facility where many of the protesters clashed with police two days earlier. An estimated 1,000 activists from around the country came to Ridglan Farms in an attempt Saturday to free an estimated 2,000 beagles kept there. Police repelled them with tear gas, rubber bullets and pepper spray. Many of those who were at the facility returned to the Capitol on Monday to demand that Evers take action. Ridglan has denied mistreating animals.