PETA Statement: Disqualification of Justify

For Immediate Release:
December 10, 2020

Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382

Please see the following statement from PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo regarding the California stewards’ decision not to disqualify Justify from the 2018 Santa Anita Derby for a violation of medication regulations after it was found that Justify and Hoppertunity had scopolamine in their systems:

The California stewards have failed the horses, the racing industry, the trainers who don’t cheat, and the bettors. Justify and Hoppertunity were drugged—however the scopolamine got into their systems—and Bob Baffert is ultimately responsible. Baffert, with his long history of medication violations, including four drug positives this year alone, should be banned from racing. The stewards should be ashamed of this ruling.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment or abuse in any other way”—opposes speciesism, which is a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.