“This could put farmers like me and my dad out of business and drive 12,000 jobs out of our state.”Īnother meeting between the attorney general’s office and poultry company representatives was coming up.

“(Edmondson) is getting ready to sue our industry,” said a chicken farmer in a newspaper advertisement published by the Oklahoma Farm Bureau. * The Oklahoma Farm Bureau attacked the state's attorney general over the lawsuit with the backing of poultry companies.Īs the calendar turned to 2005, Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson grew more frustrated each time he opened the newspaper or turned on the radio.įor nearly four years, his office had been meeting with representatives of several large poultry companies, including Tyson Foods, in hopes of reaching an agreement to rein in the pollution from chicken litter in the Illinois River Watershed.īut Edmondson believed those same companies were also funding ads accusing him of trying to put small chicken farms out of business, leading to calls into his office from worried chicken farmers and their representatives in the state Legislature. * During negotiations, poultry companies made offers they knew the state would not accept. In public, they said they wanted to protect local farms. * In private, poultry companies blamed chicken farmers for pollution, records show.

Wisconsin motion to dismiss