Alliance for Animals

Alliance for Animals is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit (EIN 39-1456655) based in Madison, Wisconsin, whose published mission emphasizes that animals “should not be treated as the property of another.” The organization operates across a broad mandate: animals in laboratories, wildlife, farmed animals, companion animals, and animals in entertainment. Tax-exempt since March 1984, it has maintained continuous operations for over four decades in Wisconsin politics.

What makes Alliance for Animals distinctive is not its budget — which is modest at $41,878 in FY2023 revenue with $0 officer compensation — but its institutional longevity and political relationships. When the Alliance joins a legal petition or legislative campaign, it brings four decades of credibility in the Wisconsin advocacy landscape that newer organizations cannot replicate. A historical “About” page stated the organization employed one part-time paid employee and relied on “volunteers, members, and donors,” reflecting a small-organization operating model.

Rick Marolt has been a long-standing figure associated with the organization's public presence and advocacy work, while Sara Andrews serves as Executive Director per the 2025–2026 Wisconsin state lobbying registry. The state registry lists lobbying interests spanning “animals in laboratories” alongside companion animals, wildlife, farmed animals, and animals in entertainment.

The Ridglan campaign is intertwined with DxE's 2017 open rescue. Three activists (including Wayne Hsiung) entered Ridglan at night in April 2017, documented conditions via photos and video, and removed three beagles. Felony charges followed, but the case was dismissed approximately 10 days before the March 18, 2024 trial date when the State moved to dismiss.

DxE's “Right to Rescue” campaign page identifies this as a pivot point: former defendants became petitioners, and Alliance for Animals joined as a co-petitioner in the special-prosecutor process. The coordination operated through shared personnel and litigation framing rather than a purely formal coalition structure — Wayne Hsiung served as both a former DxE-affiliated defendant and a named co-petitioner alongside Alliance for Animals and Dane4Dogs.

PETA publicly credited Alliance for Animals in its January 9, 2025 press statement on the special prosecutor appointment, congratulating Dane4Dogs, Wayne Hsiung, and Alliance for Animals for exposing conditions at Ridglan Farms.

In 2015, Alliance for Animals partnered with the Animal Legal Defense Fund (ALDF) on a mobile-billboard tour in Milwaukee and Madison (May 6–15) protesting controversial “terror tests” on infant rhesus macaques at the University of Wisconsin–Madison — one of the largest recipients of NIH primate research funding in the country. The campaign targeted public awareness of experiments that ALDF characterized as “controversial” and “secretive.”

The UW-Madison primate work reflects the Alliance's long-standing “animals in laboratories” mandate, explicitly listed in its state lobbying registry entry for the 2025–2026 legislative session. This positions the organization at the intersection of local university politics and national research-funding debates.