Ted Poe: “I thank the gentleman for yielding and for filing this amendment. Mr. Chairman, the VA has been using taxpayer dollars…”

“I thank the gentleman for yielding and for filing this amendment. Mr. Chairman, the VA has been using taxpayer dollars to have experiments on dogs. It is hard to believe that would occur in our culture today. I have had three Dalmatians over the years, and I know there are a lot of other people who have dogs. They have service dogs that are used by our vets and our agencies. And the thought that our Veterans Administration would go ahead and torture dogs in the name of science and experiments is not acceptable; it is just not. If citizens committed these acts that the VA is committing on dogs, under most laws, that would be animal cruelty. They could be prosecuted and go to jail. But because it is the VA, because it is a government agency, that doesn't apply. But we do want the agency to stop torturing dogs in the name of science. There are better ways that they can spend the money, better ways they can figure out how to help our veterans besides taking careless actions against, as my friend from Virginia said, man's best friend. And if it's going to be man's best friend, maybe we shouldn't be, or we should not be torturing those dogs for any reason. So I support the amendment.”