Animal Outlook is a national nonprofit 501(c)(3) animal advocacy organization.
Through groundbreaking investigations, strategic legal advocacy, and outreach, we expose the realities of animal agribusiness and challenge the systems that allow cruelty to persist. We hold the industry accountable and empower people to create meaningful change for animals.
Behind this work is a small, determined team of investigators, attorneys, and advocates. Since 1995, they’ve gone where few are willing to go, uncovered what the industry would rather keep hidden, and turned evidence into action. Meet the people who make that work possible.
Your generous donations have been helping us expose the truth about animal agriculture and inspire people to choose compassion for 30 years. See our full donation breakdown, Form 990, and reports.
View Financial Reports →Compassion Over Killing started as five teenagers and a banner. It became Animal Outlook. This is how.
Five students in Maryland put a name to what they believed: compassion over killing. The yearbook called it “an animal rights group based on non-violent direct action.” That sentence still describes the work.
Before there was an office there were rooftops, leaflets, a print zine, and local TV crews.
ON THE ROOF OF A MCDONALD’S, “DON’T SUPPORT MCMURDER,” LATE 1990s
MIYUN PARK, EARLY COMPASSION OVER KILLING PRESIDENT, WITH A RESCUED HEN
FOX 5 COVERS A COMPASSION OVER KILLING PROTEST, 1990s
ABC 7 COVERS A COMPASSION OVER KILLING FUR PROTEST, 1990s
THE ABOLITIONIST, COMPASSION OVER KILLING’S PRINT ZINE
THE NEIMAN MARCUS FUR CAMPAIGN ON OUR WEBSITE, 2002
A hidden camera inside a Maryland egg farm. Then another. The industry called the cages “animal care certified.” The footage said otherwise, and The New York Times and The Washington Post ran it. That same summer, 380 D.C. Metro buses carried our ads.
OUR WEBSITE ANNOUNCES ADS ON 380 D.C. METRO BUSES, JUNE 2002
ABC 7 AIRS OUR “ANIMAL CARE CERTIFIED” EGG FARM INVESTIGATION, 2004
THE NEW YORK TIMES ON OUR EGG FARM INVESTIGATION, DECEMBER 2002
NYT AND WAPO ON THE EGG LABEL RULING: “A WIN FOR ANIMALS AND CONSUMERS,” 2005
NBC NEWS ON THE EGG INDUSTRY’S MISLEADING ADS, 2004
COMPASSION OVER KILLING CELEBRATES 15 YEARS, 2010
Investigations are the strongest pillar in the advocacy movement.
Central Valley Meat supplied beef to the National School Lunch Program. Our investigator filmed inside. Within days the USDA suspended the plant, and In-N-Out and McDonald’s dropped the supplier. It led ABC World News Tonight.
CNN: USDA SUSPENDS CENTRAL VALLEY MEAT AFTER OUR FOOTAGE, 2012
ABC NEWS: IN-N-OUT DROPS THE SUPPLIER, 2012
ASSOCIATED PRESS: TYSON FIRES 10 WORKERS AFTER OUR INVESTIGATION, 2016
THE WASHINGTON POST ON OUR TYSON FOOTAGE, 2016
ERICA MEIER ON CNN: CHICKENS BURIED ALIVE AT A PILGRIM’S SUPPLIER, 2014
CBS NEWS: SLAUGHTERHOUSE SHUT AFTER VIDEO SHOWS EXTREME ABUSE, 2012
VEGNEWS: MOBY PLAYS AN ACOUSTIC SET FOR COMPASSION OVER KILLING IN BEVERLY HILLS, 2015
MOBY ASKS FANS TO TAKE THE VEGWEEK PLEDGE, 2015
Undercover investigators like Scott David spent months inside the operations the industry hides. Our 2016 footage from Tyson contract farms in Virginia led to nine workers convicted on twenty-two counts of animal cruelty.
Most people have no idea
what horrors are going on
behind closed doors.
The USDA proposed letting slaughter lines run faster. A quarter million people said no. We said it outside the USDA, at the Metro, at McDonald’s, and with an NBA champion.
ROB ZOMBIE JOINS THE FIGHT AGAINST HIGH-SPEED SLAUGHTER, 2018
THE “USDA: NOT SO FAST” RALLY OUTSIDE USDA HEADQUARTERS, 2018
NBA CHAMPION METTA WORLD PEACE FRONTS THE “NOT SO FAST” CAMPAIGN, 2018
THE TYSON CAMPAIGN TAKES TO THE D.C. METRO, 2018
VOLUNTEERS OUTSIDE MCDONALD’S, 2018
Law plays the unique role in our society of legitimizing moral progress.
DC VegFest was the largest vegan festival on the East Coast. Free, and by the end more than 20,000 people a year. In 2018, Hurricane Florence forced the first cancellation in its history. It came back the next summer at Nationals Park – then COVID shut down gatherings everywhere, and bringing back something that size was more than a small team could carry. It didn’t return. The work it started did.
REP. JAMIE RASKIN SPEAKS AT DC VEGFEST, 2017
DC VEGFEST VOLUNTEERS, 2017
COMPASSION OVER KILLING ON THE NATIONALS PARK SCOREBOARD, DC VEGFEST 2019
DC VEGFEST ON GOOD MORNING WASHINGTON, 2017
ERICA MEIER AT DC VEGFEST, 2017
HOLIDAY BENEFIT, 2018Twenty-five years in, Compassion Over Killing became Animal Outlook. The investigations, the litigation, and the people stayed exactly the same.
FEB 10, 2020: JOAQUIN PHOENIX, THE DAY AFTER THE OSCARS, CARRYING A CALF OUT OF MANNING BEEF, LOS ANGELES
MOBY WITH A RESCUED GOAT AND TURKEY, 2024
“A NEW ERA”: THE REBRAND TO ANIMAL OUTLOOK, 2020
TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OF COMPASSION OVER KILLING, 2020
20,000 SIGN OUR DUNKIN’ PETITION; DUNKIN’ ADDS OAT MILK NATIONWIDE, 2020
Farm Transitions helps farmers leave animal agriculture without leaving farming. Bill Ferguson was the first. He turned a broiler house into a lettuce farm, and his family grows there still. It’s the most hopeful thing we do.
BILL FERGUSON, RILEY CREEK FARMS: VISIONARY GROWER AWARD, 2025
ERIN WING’S TEDx TALK, “THE INCONVENIENT PLATE”
THE SUPREME COURT UPHOLDS PROP 12, 2023
What inspires me to do this work is the belief thatchange is possible.
Investigations running. Cases in federal court. Farmers choosing a different future. Thirty years in, the work is far from over.
ANIMAL OUTLOOK’S LEGAL TEAM, 2026
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR BEN WILLIAMSON AT A PROTEST, 2025
OUR RAW MILK DAIRY INVESTIGATION, 2025
OUR LAWSUIT AGAINST KROGER AND RALPHS, 2026
OUR ALDI LAWSUIT, 2026Thirty years of work is thirty years of people. Three of them helped build this, and aren’t here to see it.
Chris kept this organization running for seven years, and kept it laughing the whole time. In one of his first years here he pulled in thousands of VegWeek sign-ups on organic reach alone. Before us he was New Haven hardcore: guitarist for Fastbreak, The Distance and Outbreak, a Kiss obsessive, an Ace Frehley man. After hours he was Xxiou, host of a No Man’s Sky community that reached around the world. More than a million views, and a lot of people who called him a mentor. Nothing made him happier than a colleague’s cat or dog wandering into a video call.
RIP Chris Legg! Such a great human!!! CTHC wouldn’t be what it is w/o him!
The first farmer through Farm Transitions. Bill raised chickens for more than twenty years, then turned a broiler house into a lettuce farm that feeds local schools, restaurants and grocery stores. His family runs Riley Creek Farms today, and our Farm Transitions fellowship carries his name.
Read Bill’s storyA “quiet ambassador for animals,” in her husband Elliot’s words. Rena started volunteering with us in 2011, asking restaurants to put vegan meals on the menu, and she revered the investigators who go behind closed doors. She left a legacy gift so that work could keep going.
Read Rena’s legacy
Los Angeles County’s last cow slaughterhouse is closed for good.
Manning Beef ran for nearly a century. Our investigator went inside in 2024. It shut down in 2025, and in 2026 the city revoked its permit so it can never reopen.
See the investigation
Dedicated to Truth, Compassion, and Innovation. Exposing the cruelty of factory farming since 1995, through investigations, legal advocacy, and the farmers ready to build a better food system.
Made possible by generous supporters, including
