Reports that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) used drones to survey Midwest farms are false, according to the Washington Post.
Earlier this month, the idea was reported on TV segments, multiple blogs and by at least four Congressmen.
“We’ve never thought that. We’ve never said that. I don’t know where it came from,” said Kristen Hassebrook, at the Association of Nebraska Cattlemen, in the report.
While the agency may not be using drones, for more than ten years inspectors have flown over farmland in small planes. The flights are legal under a 1986 Supreme Court decision, according to the EPA. That still doesn’t sit well with cattlemen in the Midwest.
“It is truly an invasion of privacy,” said Chuck Folken, a cattlemen in Leigh, Neb. “We don’t need our own government flying over us, taking pictures of us, telling us what we’re doing wrong.”