The white peaks of Mount Timpanogos loom against a blue spring sky, an iconic Heber Valley backdrop. Debra West leads a brown-and-white paint horse into a pasture overlooking the city, a mini donkey trailing in their wake, and grabs on to her cowboy hat at a gust of wind.

The red rock and sage-covered lands are just a small part of what makes up Liberty Sanctuary, the equine-rescue nonprofit created by West and her husband, Scott Horner. In the past year, West has filled these lands to the brim with equines rescued from the slaughter pipeline, welcoming them to the Wasatch Back with open arms. Now with 26 new “kids,” West has her hands full.

Some were bought and transported from a large kill pen in Bowie, Texas, she said. Others are babies from a roundup at the Wind River Reservation that were sent to the Fabrizius kill pen in Colorado. Still others are adopted mustangs entrusted to the care of the sanctuary.

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Many of them are still very young — some arrive at the sanctuary just a few months old, already scarred by traumatic experiences and separations from families.

“Young horses make up 92.3% of the slaughter pipeline,” said West. A silver lining? These young horses are able to rehabilitate and learn a lot more quickly. 

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Rehabilitation and adopting out are the primary goals at Liberty Sanctuary, with a staff of horse trainers who are working to get their youngest kids comfortable with humans, as well with equipment like leads. According to Eric Kraut, director of equine wellness and certified vet technician, they don’t “break” these wild equines; they “start” them.

Kraut, who lives on the property, has spent months working with the youngest babies, a group of 12 who arrived from the Wind River Reservation last August. Showing them he’s not a threat, he slowly gets them accustomed to the feeling of human touch, a rope on their side and, for the bravest ones, a lead on their faces. 

“They’re horses that have fallen through the cracks,” said West. “​​A lot of them haven’t been trained properly from the beginning, so they don’t have the foundation, and if they’ve had human interactions, they’ve been more negative than positive. And so when they come, they’re really afraid of you.” 

Once West and Kraut determine these horses are safe around humans, more afraid than aggressive, they use a network of volunteers to help out and begin building positive interactions for the animals. They currently have 50 active volunteers who assist with feeding and other needs, West said. 

But their work is only just scratching the surface as 20,000 horses a year are rounded up and sent to their deaths.

While the horse slaughter industry is technically banned in the U.S., certain profiteers have kept the business alive by shipping equines across borders where they are killed for consumption, primarily in Mexico. Kill buyers, they’re called, will attend auctions at kill pens like the ones in Texas and Colorado to purchase these horses, then pack them into a trailer for the long journey across the borders.

The demand for horse meat has gone down in recent years, West said. This is especially the case given research showing that horse meat from the U.S. is unsuitable for human consumption due to medications that are administered to these animals as companion animals, not livestock. 

But people are still trying to make money off of and around the practice.

“These kill buyers are still continuing to do their work. They may be shipping less to Mexico, but now they are using slaughter as a marketing tool. And they become basically horse traders. And what they do is they post these horses online … and they prey on kind people and their last dollars to save these horses or else they’re sending them to slaughter. And they use that slaughter thing as pressure to encourage people to pick up horses,” West said.

It’s an issue West quickly became passionate about, especially after getting to know the kind, gentle personalities of the horses who’d been rescued. In addition to starting Liberty Sanctuary to take in the animals, West got connected with other equine rescues across the country to learn more about the legislation that might finally put an end to the slaughter industry and equine cruelty. In March, she lobbied with one group at Capitol Hill to learn more about the efforts being made.

“Part of what I learned, too, is that everything people have been doing for 20 years is not moving the needle. We need to come up with other solutions,” she said.

Along with Scott Beckstead, a longtime animal rights lawyer and professor of animal law at Willamette University, West is dedicated to coming up with more facts-based solutions regarding the treatment of horses. The two of them started EquineIQ, which is a networking platform for industry professionals to brainstorm and activate standalone initiatives, furthering research that can be used to change certain practices that contribute to the continuing survival of the slaughter pipeline.

West also started SAFEAct.org, which launches later this month. It’s a user-friendly website to educate people on the Save America’s Forgotten Equines Act (HR 3475/S 2037), a bill which is designed to amend the 2018 Dog and Cat Meat Trade Prohibition Act to add “or equines.” One of the primary ways to get this bill through Congress is by writing to legislators, she said. The SAFEAct.org site will streamline the process so that users can write in to their representatives in just a few clicks. 

A New York City-native with a marketing background with companies like Warner Records and Sony Music, West never could have imagined this life for herself. But after moving to the Wasatch Back following the 2002 Olympics, she fell in love with the West and along with it, horses.

For her, rescuing these horses isn’t just about doing a good deed. It’s also about putting an end to the system as a whole. Once they’ve had time and space to heal, these animals are amazing and worthwhile companions, she said.

“These horses have long lives ahead of them, and they can be really productive members of this society and the economy,” she said. “The numbers just speak for themselves. These horses that we’re going to adopt out this summer, they’re going to encourage the sale of feed, tack, possibly people will hire trainers to work with them. I mean, it creates its own economy, and they’re worth more here in the United States than sending them by the pound like a piece of chicken for slaughter in Mexico.”

For Alesia Valentine, the director of volunteer activities, these animals have already made a world of impact for her and her fellow volunteers.

“All of us volunteers get so much fulfillment out of it. At the same time, we’re helping them find their happy homes,” she said. Some volunteers find that time with these animals soothes grief or brings fulfillment while fighting a terminal illness, West said.

April is volunteer month, and Liberty Sanctuary welcomes anyone, regardless of experience. 

“Whatever your strong suits and anything that you can contribute is so helpful because we do operate on volunteers and donations, and she can’t do it all on her own. So it really takes this whole little Liberty Village to make it run,” said Valentine.

The volunteer application is located under the “Volunteer” tab on the website, libertysanctuary.org. Learn more about West’s activism efforts at equineiq.org and SAFEAct.org. Some of the horses will be available for adoption starting this summer, West said, and anyone interested can reach out through the website.

“We’d like people to understand that these are workable horses. It takes commitment, but they can really have wonderful lives right here in the USA,” said West. “Everyone’s next horse should be a rescue.”