Wayne Hsiung

Wayne Hsiung is an American activist and attorney. Hsiung is a co-founder of The Simple Heart Initiative and previously led the animal rights group Direct Action Everywhere (DxE), which he also co-founded. During his time as a lawyer, he worked with the law firms DLA Piper and Steptoe & Johnson, was a Searle Fellow and visiting assistant professor at the Northwestern University School of Law, and a National Science Foundation-funded graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Hsiung ran for mayor of Berkeley, California, in 2020, largely focused on the issue of animal rights, and earned 24% of the vote, defeated by incumbent Jesse Arreguin.

Hsiung was incarcerated in November 2023 after being convicted of felony trespassing for his role in an open rescue of sick and dying chickens from Sunrise Farms in 2018. Prior to this trial, Hsiung had been found guilty of two felonies; in other jurisdictions he has faced charges of up to 60 years in prison. In the most serious case, Hsiung was offered resolution that involved no prison time, on the condition that he refrain from criticizing the company he had investigated, Smithfield Foods; he and co-defendant Paul Picklesimer refused the offer and were acquitted after trial in October 2022.

Hsiung's parents emigrated from Taiwan in the 1970s. His father did work involving vivisection for several years, which left a lasting impact on Hsiung and motivated him to become an animal rights activist. He also was influenced by Patty Mark, founder of Animal Liberation Victoria.

Hsiung attended DePauw University when he was 16, graduating from the University of Chicago in 2001 with a Bachelor's degree in political science. He received a National Science Foundation graduate fellowship to study economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, but he went on leave after his first year to pursue a joint JD/PhD.^{[citation needed]} He attended the University of Chicago Law School with a focus on behavioral law and economics.^{[citation needed]} After graduating, Hsiung taught at Northwestern's Pritzker School of Law as a visiting assistant professor.

As a lawyer, Hsiung was involved in environmental activism and studied with legal scholar Eric Posner and economist Mark Duggan.^{[citation needed]} He coauthored an analysis of the effect of climate change on nonhuman animals with behavioral law and economics scholar Cass Sunstein. Hsiung was suspended by the California State Bar in March 2024, but was reinstated in May 2024.

In January 2015, Hsiung organized an "open rescue/investigation" on a certified humane egg farm in Petaluma, California. Hsiung and Direct Action Everywhere protesters climbed over a barbed wire fence to enter an egg farm and take video of alleged animal abuses such as confinement, preening from stress, and lack of water. In January 2015, DxE released a video narrated by Hsiung that showed him and other activists rescuing a hen. In the video there are birds with blisters and missing feathers. These hens were from a "cage-free" egg farm at Petaluma Farms, a major west-coast supplier to Whole Foods and Organic Valley. Hsiung, as the narrator, refers to the "stench," "filth," and "misery" around him. He shows several birds that appear to have blisters, missing feathers, and caked-on feces, though some birds have no visible health problems. The crew dramatically rescues one injured bird, handing her over the fence, one activist to another, and rushing her to a vet in Berkeley, who declares the bird to be in dismal shape.

In April 2016, Hsiung and two other members of DxE went to Yulin, China, the location of the infamous Dog Meat Festival, to document the animal cruelty. In one of the videos, dogs screamed as they were beaten to death. Hsiung and two other DxE activists removed three dogs from the facility. Hsiung claims that he was beaten and arrested in China for the theft of the three dogs and held for two days.

In 2017, Hsiung, along with four other DxE activists, investigated a pig farm owned by Smithfield Foods in Utah and rescued two piglets from the facility. FBI agents were dispatched to look for these piglets and searched two animal sanctuaries in Utah and Colorado. Witnesses of the raids said the FBI agents sought DNA samples from pigs at the facilities as part of a search for the missing piglets. To obtain the DNA samples, the state veterinarians accompanying the FBI cut off close to two inches of a piglet's ear at one of the sanctuaries. Hsiung was indicted in Utah on multiple charges including felonies (burglary, livestock theft, and engaging in a pattern of illegal activity) and a misdemeanor riot charge relating to a break-in "investigation of animal cruelty" at this Smithfield Foods farm. Journalist Glenn Greenwald at The Intercept reported that the prosecution was politically motivated, as attorneys prosecuting the case had financial ties to Smithfield.