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Lucky ducks! Court upholds California’s foie gras ban

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The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upholds California's statewide ban on the production and sale of foie gras. (30721)
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upholds California’s statewide ban on the production and sale of foie gras.

A federal appeals court decided to uphold California’s statewide ban on the production and sale of foie gras, the French delicacy of fattened duck or goose liver. The ban went into effect on July 1, 2012.

The plaintiffs — the Association des Eleveurs de Canards et d’Oies du Quebec (a Canadian association of duck and geese farmers), California-based Hot’s Restaurant Group and New York’s Hudson Valley Foie Gras — asserted the ban interfered with interstate commerce and was too vaguely worded.

Judge Harry Pregerson wrote the opinion for the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, saying: “Plaintiffs give us no reason to doubt that the State believed that the sales ban in California may discourage the consumption of products produced by force feeding birds and prevent complicity in a practice that it deemed cruel to animals.”

Sarah LeTrent | CNN

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