PETA sure knows how to attract a crowd of Congressional staffers. First, the animal rights group offers free food. In this case, veggie dogs. And second, they give staffers something to look at.
Doling out the free hot dogs in front of the Rayburn House Office Building on Thursday were two women sporting lettuce-leaf bikinis and “Go Veg” signs, otherwise known as the “Lettuce Ladies.”
A summertime event with the “Lettuce Ladies” is a tradition that dates back to at least 2009, when PETA tapped two Playboy Playmates, including the 2008 Playmate of the Year Jayde Nicole, to do the job. (Nicole later became semi-famous for dating Brody Jenner, a “Hills” cast member, who is stepbrother to the Kardashian clan.)
“The bikinis are a great way we can highlight the health benefits of vegan and vegetarian diets,” explained Lindsay Rajt, PETA’s associate director of international grassroots campaigns. “Obviously they highlight that they can help you keep off unwanted pounds and, on average, vegans are about 18 percent thinner than their meat-eating counterparts,” Rajt added.
This year, the models were local vegetarians–Dana Watkins and Jessica Greeves–who said they were feeling a bit jittery about the gig since Washington dresses so conservatively. On top of that, they were due at the PETA tent the same time a pro-immigration protest was marching through Capitol Hill. That left them traipsing through the crowd in high-heels and white terry-cloth robes. “It looked like we were going to be streakers or something,” Greeves laughed. But the duo quickly got over it, happily posing for photogs and staffers alike.
