Law & Policy Active Updated Aug 6, 2026
The FAA drone ban fight
A proposed FAA rule would let farms and slaughterhouses request no-fly zones over their property by having agriculture named a critical-infrastructure sector, closing off a tool activists have used for over a decade to film factory-farm conditions from public airspace. Meat industry groups including the National Pork Producers Council and North Carolina Poultry Federation lobbied for the change after drone footage repeatedly exposed conditions inside hog and poultry operations. The fight is whether the Trump administration finalizes the fast-tracked rule after public comment closed.
The story so far
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Aug 6, 2026 Latest
Public comment closed August 6 on a proposed FAA rule letting farms and slaughterhouses among 16 named critical-infrastructure sectors request drone flight bans over their property, which would create expanded no-fly zones affecting more than 800,000 US-registered drones; industry groups including the National Pork Producers Council and North Carolina Poultry Federation told the FAA that activists have used drones to film hog and poultry operations for over a decade.
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