As you may know, “soring” is the intentional injuring of a horse’s legs or hooves in order to force them to perform an artificial or exaggerated gait. This extremely painful practice was made illegal in the 1970s when Congress passed the Horse Protection Act. Unfortunately, as a result of inadequate policing, horses have continued to suffer from the cruel practice of soring.

But here’s the good news: the House just passed the Prevent All Soring Tactics (PAST) Act to strengthen and improve protections so we can put an end to soring once and for all. Specifically, the bill will ban the use of “action devices” such as boots, collars, chains, weighted shoes and other mechanisms, which are placed on horse limbs to alter their gaits.

It’s sad that this piece of legislation even had to be written, but I’m glad that the House has taken action to make sure this torture of horses comes to a long overdue end.

Read the bill here.