{"id":323,"date":"2026-06-10T11:10:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-10T11:10:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/modernhomejournals.com\/?p=323"},"modified":"2026-06-10T11:10:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-10T11:10:13","slug":"the-pet-duck-helping-the-effort-to-ban-foie-gras-in-d-c","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/modernhomejournals.com\/?p=323","title":{"rendered":"The pet duck helping the effort to ban foie gras in D.C."},"content":{"rendered":"
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For being involved in a political campaign, Olivia Gray isn\u2019t one for words. But when she does make noise, it has the sound of a familiar refrain: Quack, quack, quack.<\/p>\n

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\u201cShe doesn\u2019t have a voice that\u2019s English-speaking, so I have to be her translator,\u201d said Meghan Abrego, her owner. \u201cWe\u2019re just trying to save her friends.\u201d<\/p>\n

One could forgive Olivia for not saying anything \u2013 she is a duck, after all. But her presence at Eastern Market on a recent Sunday played an important role in the effort to implement one of the quirkier ballot initiatives in recent D.C. memory.<\/p>\n

Olivia and Abrego approached shoppers with petitions in hand, asking them to support a ban on the sale and production of foie gras, which comes from the livers of ducks and geese that have been fattened up. The French consider it a delicacy; animal rights activists say it\u2019s a disgrace, arguing that its production most frequently entails force-feeding fowl.<\/p>\n

\u201cLook at her, she\u2019s relaxed and happy,\u201d Abrego said, pointing to Olivia as she waddled around in front of a crowd of curious onlookers. A Swedish blue, Olivia is domesticated. \u201cWhy not embrace being a duck for what they truly are and can be?\u201d<\/p>\n

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Organizers with the campaign for what is formally known as Initiative 86, launched this year by Pro-Animal D.C., say they are three quarters of the way toward collecting the roughly 24,000 signatures from D.C. voters they need to get on the ballot. Should the group succeed by early July, D.C. voters will get the chance to vote on Initiative 86 in November.<\/p>\n

The efforts aren\u2019t limited to D.C. An allied group has already gathered the necessary signatures to put a similar foie gras ban to voters in Denver<\/u><\/span>, and lawmakers in Portland, Oregon, recently (and narrowly) approved their own ban<\/u><\/span>. Pittsburgh took the same step just over two years ago<\/u><\/span>. California has banned the production of foie gras for more than a decade.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is one of the most uniquely cruel factory farming processes,\u201d said Cady Witt, the campaign\u2019s director in D.C. \u201cIt\u2019s one of the only ones where they use force-feeding and where they have the intention to give an animal a disease.\u201d<\/p>\n

The campaign\u2019s petition circulators \u2013 some of whom came to D.C. from Denver \u2013 lean heavily into describing the force-feeding that ducks and geese undergo, which they equate to essentially giving the animals liver disease; an image on the back of their clipboards shows a duck with a funnel shoved down its throat.<\/p>\n

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It is, Witt concedes, a niche issue in the greater scheme of animal rights advocacy. She calls foie gras a \u201cfancy rich-people product,\u201d but also says dozens of restaurants in D.C. serve it. A recent study<\/u><\/span> from Colorado State University\u2019s Animal-Human Policy Center says D.C. is tied with Las Vegas for having the second-highest number of restaurants serving foie gras in the country; New York is first.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s probably down from where things were even a few years ago, largely because of the D.C. Coalition Against Foie Gras<\/u><\/span>, a local activist group that has demanded that restaurants in the city stop serving the product. Their tactics have included loud protests outside and inside restaurants; one restaurateur unsuccessfully sued the group over its aggressive tactics<\/u><\/span>.<\/p>\n

But the co-owner and chef of one of the D.C. restaurants still serving foie gras says it\u2019s misunderstood. \u201cIt is my favorite ingredient, hands down,\u201d says Bart Hutchins of Butterworth\u2019s on Capitol Hill, where a $29 dish features foie gras paired with lamb tartare and an onion ring.<\/p>\n

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\u201cAmerica has a culture of enjoying parts of the animal that aren\u2019t prime cuts,\u201d he says. \u201cWe used to be able to get liver and onions on the menu. We\u2019ve lost that. Foie gras is one of those low barriers to entry to get back into that. It\u2019s hyper-palatable.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Hutchins says it\u2019s a year-round dish in the restaurant, which is popular with<\/u><\/span> Republican administration officials and congressional staffers, and one of its most ordered.<\/p>\n

Hutchins \u2013 who also recently served a foie gras ice cream \u2013 disputes that ducks and geese are harmed in the production of the ingredient, and that in the greater fight for animal rights and a healthier food system, there are greater battles to be fought.<\/p>\n

\u201cCommercial pigs are disgusting. Commercial chickens, too,\u201d he says. \u201cWe could ban the sales of animals raised that way, or there are many ways we could be conscious of animals and the quality of our foods, but this isn\u2019t one.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Animal rights activists like Max Broad of D.C. Voters for Animals<\/u><\/span> don\u2019t disagree that there are other, more widespread issues that merit attention, though he says focusing on foie gras makes strategic sense.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis being kind of niche makes it digestible,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s not a sweeping change, it\u2019s small and it makes sense. And it\u2019s not going to raise hackles because a lot of people don\u2019t eat it or even know what it is. It\u2019s something people can get on board with without making any sacrifice.\u201d<\/p>\n

There have been similar niche efforts in D.C. in the past. In 2020, the D.C. Council passed a bill<\/u><\/span> banning the sale of ivory and rhino horns. A later push to ban fur sales faltered<\/u><\/span>, though. And while ballot initiatives have become a regular feature of D.C. elections over the past decade \u2013 voters have weighed in on everything from legalizing marijuana possession to implementing ranked-choice voting \u2013 and they usually pass, a 1991 initiative to ban horse-drawn carriages in the city failed.<\/p>\n

Witt says she\u2019s confident the campaign will collect the signatures it needs to get on the November ballot. And if it\u2019s approved by voters, she thinks it will carry symbolic weight. \u201cIf we can get this banned here, the force-feeding of birds,\u201d she says, \u201cwe\u2019ll set a precedent for the rest of the country.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Hutchins hopes it doesn\u2019t even get that far. But if it does, he says he\u2019s already agreed to a televised debate on the issue. \u201cIt\u2019s so easy to be uneducated about the things we\u2019re voting on. It is to some extent a really good example of politics of our time: all outrage and no substance,\u201d he says. \u201cI would encourage people not to sign it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Back at Eastern Market, though, D.C. resident Nick Wall was convinced enough by a circulator\u2019s pitch \u2013 and Olivia\u2019s presence \u2013 that he signed the petition to get Initiative 86 on the ballot. \u201cI don\u2019t like the idea of force-feeding anything,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Read more Pennsylvania Republican Gubernatorial Nominee Stacy Garrity Working With Acquitted Sex Assault Defendant<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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