Colorado animal rights activist Ellen Kessler, who recently resigned from the Colorado State Board of Veterinary Medicine after facing backlash for calling ranchers “lazy” and “nasty,” has been charged with 13 misdemeanor counts of animal cruelty.
CBS Denver reported the Jefferson County Animal Control investigators received a complaint about Kessler and found 13 birds in cages in her home that were caked with animal waste and urine, flies and dead and live mice. One of the birds was also dead, and another died later at the vet.
Gov. Jared Polis (D) appointed Kessler to the Board of Veterinary Medicine in 2020, which created extreme controversy among agriculture.
In January, Kessler replied to a Facebook post about a collaboration program for ranchers to deal with grizzly bear attacks, saying, “Would our lazy and nasty ranchers/cattlemen even raise a finger to make something like this work or is using a cow to bait the wolves their solution?”
The ensuing backlash from the post led to her resigning from the board.
