PETA Statement: Brent Sass’ Iditarod ‘Win’ Makes Him Top Dog Abuser

For Immediate Release:
March 15, 2022

Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382

Below, please find a statement from PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman in response to Brent Sass “winning” the 2022 Iditarod this morning:

Brent Sass, whose dogs have died in other races and who keeps his dogs chained to wooden boxes and plastic barrels in the bitter cold, has only scored the cruelty crown, nothing more. This top dog abuser left behind three dogs who could no longer carry on, meaning the remaining ones had to work even harder to pull him. This is par for the course for Sass, who pushed dogs so far beyond their breaking point during a previous dog-sledding race that he had to call for rescue. The days are numbered for crude, outdated entertainment like the Iditarod.

PETA notes that chaos and cruelty abounded in this year’s Iditarod. More than 200 dogs have been pulled from the race so far, a dog went missing, a musher was apparently forced out of the race after dogs he used were found in poor condition, and dogs were attacked and one was killed during training before the race even began.

This year, Millennium Hotels and Resorts and Nutanix joined ExxonMobil—a former major sponsor that had paid the race $250,000 a year—as well as Jack Daniel’s, Coca-Cola, Wells Fargo, Alaska Airlines, and 14 other companies in cutting ties with the Iditarod. Only a few major corporate sponsors, such as Liberty Media subsidiary GCI, remain—and PETA recently bought stock in Liberty Broadband to push it to drop its sponsorship.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information on PETA’s investigative newsgathering and reporting, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.