New Jersey Becomes First State Ever to Ban Traveling Wild-Animal Acts

With New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy’s signature, “Nosey’s Law” is officially on the books! Despite a setback for the bill under the former administration, the Garden State is now the first state ever to enact a ban on traveling wild-animal acts.

Nosey, The Elephant Sanctuary

The Elephant Sanctuary  

This monumental victory for animals comes after more than a decade of persistence by PETA activists, who worked resolutely to save the elephant whose story inspired this ban—Nosey.

Thankfully, Nosey was seized at last from her abusers after she was found chained and swaying back and forth in her own waste, suffering from urinary tract and skin infections, intestinal parasites, painful osteoarthritis, dehydration, and malnutrition. She now lives at The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee and will never again endure violent blows from sharp bullhooks or be forced to give rides to humans.

Nosey, The Elephant Sanctuary

The Elephant Sanctuary  

Our efforts to save Nosey inspired one of the most progressive bans on wild-animal acts to date.

Nosey’s former handler, Hugo Liebel, caused outrage in 2015 when he took her to the New Jersey State Fair. People were horrified to see this lonely, stressed, and painfully arthritic elephant plodding in circles day after day, and they called for the fair to stop the act. Raymond J. Lesniak, then a state senator, called on the New Jersey Division of Fish & Wildlife to investigate but realized that further measures were needed. So he introduced Nosey’s Law in order to ban traveling elephant acts in the state—and the law has since been expanded to cover other wild and exotic animals as well.

Nosey’s Law overwhelmingly passed the legislature just as the 2017 session closed. But to the dismay of animal advocates everywhere, exiting Gov. Chris Christie “pocket vetoed” the bill.

Nonetheless, in 2018, Sen. Nilsa Cruz-Perez and Assemblymembers Raj Mukherji, Andrew Zwicker, and Jamel Holley cosponsored the bill and gave it new life. Nosey’s Law passed the state’s General Assembly with a vote of 71 to 3 and passed unanimously in the Senate.

PETA thanks the animal advocates in New Jersey for standing against the exploitation, isolation, and physical violence that so many animals still endure in the entertainment industry. New Jersey has become a model for every state to follow!

Nosey, The Elephant Sanctuary

The Elephant Sanctuary  

It’s only a matter of time before abusing animals so that they’ll perform is a thing of the past.

In 2017, both Illinois and New York banned all traveling elephant acts. Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus shut down. Hundreds of venues and dozens of communities across the country now prohibit wild-animal acts. The public has made it clear that it doesn’t want to see feeling, thinking, sensitive animals be bullied into performing uncomfortable and often painful tricks. But we still have work to do.

You can help animals who are beaten, electrocuted, and confined to tiny cages in the circus.

No living being exists simply to be a spectacle or to entertain humans—yet all circuses and traveling shows that use animals treat them as mere props, denying them their freedom and an adequate standard of living.

Using our action form below, please write to venues and urge them to allow any scheduled circus performances to go forward only if they do so without animal acts.

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PETA President Takes On the Elephant Slave Trade

Right now, elephants in India—some with tuberculosis, most with rotted, painful feet—are being beaten with bullhooks to make them fearful, compliant, and willing to let tourists ride on their backs. They’ve been beaten badly since they were removed from their mothers and put into chains. But right now, PETA and PETA India are battling to end the elephant slave trade.

PETA President Ingrid Newkirk visited Amber Fort, Jaipur, where more than 100 elephants are held captive, beaten, and forced to give rides to tourists. Many have rotted feet, some are blind in one eye, some have human-contagious tuberculosis, and all are enduring a lifetime of servitude. Wearing shackles and chains and with her hands painted blood red in protest, Newkirk sat beside two volunteers in elephant masks and described to the media what she witnessed when, just after dawn one morning, she visited the nearby elephant training center where these gentle giants are kept:

“I heard the beatings before I saw them. There was the thwack of a heavy stick against elephant hide. Then, as I rounded the corner, surprising the men, I saw them with a raised thick stick.  They threw the sticks into the bushes, but I grabbed one and put it under my coat, taking it with me when I left. One of the two elephants was small, blind in one eye—which is common—and her sides were heaving, likely from severe stress,” she said. “These poor elephants need to be freed from slavery and sent to sanctuaries where they can stay with other elephants, walk about freely without chains, and without fear. In the quest for tourists, they have been made to suffer for years.”

The documentary Gods in Shackles as well as eyewitness videos have exposed elephants being beaten and forced to work in the tourism industry. After PETA and our international affiliates presented the evidence to travel agencies, websites, and book publishers, more than 50 of them have ended promotions of captive elephant attractions, including TripAdvisor, Thomas Cook, and Gate 1 Travel. And we won’t stop until the elephant slave trade is history.

During the trip, Newkirk also spoke up for much smaller—but also abused—animals: fish.

Commercial fishing is abuse of animals on a colossal scale, cruelly killing hundreds of billions of them worldwide every year—far more than any other industry. Newkirk asked people to pause and relate to who‘s on their plate.

Please help end cruelty to animals large and small. Urge travel companies to end their promotions of elephant rides and, for your next meal, give deliciously realistic vegan seafood a try.

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