Animal Legal Defense Fund Achieves Major Victories for Animals

Animal Legal Defense Fund (ALDF) is a charity that works to advance the interests of animals through the legal system. In pursuit of this goal, ALDF:

• Files lawsuits to protect animals from harm.
• Provides animal law resources to law students, law enforcement, prosecutors, and other legal professionals.
• Supports pro-animal legislation and fights anti-animal legislation.^[1][2]

Note: this review focuses primarily on ALDF's litigation work that helps farmed animals. To learn more about ALDF's other work, click here.

Example: ALDF v. Gary Herbert (Utah's Ag-Gag Law)

In 2013, ALDF filed a constitutional challenge to Utah's Ag-Gag law, which criminalized undercover investigations of factory farms. ALDF argued that the law violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

In 2017, the U.S. District Court of Utah struck down the law as unconstitutional. No appeal was filed, making the decision final.

This victory preserved the right to expose cruelty in the animal agriculture industry, and set a precedent that similar laws are likely unconstitutional.^[3][4]

Other Notable Litigation Wins

In addition to securing a court decision striking down Utah's Ag-Gag law, in the last 10 years ALDF has contributed to:

• Striking down Ag-Gag laws in Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, North Carolina, and Arkansas, preserving the legality of undercover investigations.^[5]
• Forcing the FDA, USDA, and EPA to disclose hidden information related to factory farms and slaughterhouses.^[6][7][8]
• Protecting free speech for plant-based companies in Texas, California, Louisiana, and Arkansas—ensuring they can use labels like "vegan sausage" or "plant-based burger."^{[9][10][11][12]}

We believe these outcomes materially advance the interests of animals. To learn more about ALDF's other legal wins, click here.

Note: in addition to changing the law in specific states, each of these rulings sets legal precedent, which makes it more likely for other states to adopt similar rulings.^[13]

Active Lawsuits

As of January 2026, ALDF is working on lawsuits that aim to:

• Prevent California's cage-free egg law from being overturned.^[14]
• Stop animals from being given a drug that harms their well-being.^[15]
• Force disclosure of information relating to a government program that harms animals.^[16]

To view all of the lawsuits ALDF is currently working on, click here.

Non-Farmed Animal Litigation

It is important to note that a significant portion of ALDF's efforts address issues unrelated to farmed animals, such as pet abuse and zoos.^[1] We believe this work is less impactful, since the scale of these issues is far smaller than factory farming (which harms billions of animals every year).^[17]

As of 2025, approximately 40% of ALDF's litigation work is related to non-farmed animals.^[18] That said, ALDF's farmed animal litigation work is strong enough that we still consider their overall work to be cost-effective.

Conclusion

ALDF has made important contributions towards helping farm animals, and we consider them a strong option for donors who want to help animals efficiently.

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References

1.
ALDF: About Us
2.

ALDF: Legislative Work

Note: In 2025, ALDF stated that legislative work can be just as important for farmed animals as litigation. To this end, ALDF has been very active opposing the EATS Act and other legislative attempts to overturn CA's Prop 12 and MA's Question 3, including leading a bi-weekly coalition call. ALDF is also the lead on a federal bill to ban octopus farming, having helped pass state bans in California and Washington, and is working on the Pigs and Public Health Act which would prevent downed pigs from being slaughtered for food.

3.
ALDF v. Gary Herbert
4.
Utah's Decision to Not Appeal
5.
ALDF: Ag-Gag Laws
6.
ALDF v. U.S. Food and Drug Administration