The FOIA blog

Large Charge Brings FOIA Lawsuit

The Treasury Department's bill of over $500,000 to respond to a FOIA request concerning the once-frozen assets of a Libyan company has brough unforeseen consequences to the Department of Treasury, a lawsuit.  The Treasury Department will now have to defend its excessive FOIA fee in Court.  A similar request to the FBI only resulted in fees of $242, but of course, the FBI has yet to process and release the responsive records. 

It could get worse, the Michigan State Police have told a requester that fees on her request for records pertaining to Homeland Security Grants are estimated to be almost $6.8 million dollars.  Yes, I said million.

Government Drops Appeal on Some Documents in Telecom Immunity Case

In October, the government sought a stay to decide if it would appeal a court order that it should release documents about the Telecom industry's lobbying effort to get retroactive immunity on warrantless surveillance.  Now the Electronic Frontier Foundation has word that the government won't appeal the entire case and a release of documents--including communications between agencies and Congress about amendments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) will be made shortly.

The government continues to fight on some of the responsive documents; namely the identity of the lobbying telecoms and internal executive branch discussions, so an appeal will be filed as well on the case.

20 Years Later, CIA Answers FOIA Request

"It was 20 years ago today, that Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play." "The Beatles"

And now the FOIA version -- The CIA has released documents in a FOIA request 20 years after the request was made.  I don't really know what to say about it, 20 years is much too long for a FOIA request to sit around.  More can be found here on this no so fast moving story.

Fed Files Appeal on Disclosure Order

According to Bloomberg News, the Federal Reserve has filed an appeal in the Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit on the FOIA case that ordered it to release information on banks that got emergency loans in 2008.  The case was brought by Bloomberg news in the Southern District Court of New York.  The Fed was joined by a banking cooperative, The Clearing House Association LLC, which, go figure, also opposes disclosure.

Court Rules Postal Investigator Names Must Be Released

United States District Court Judge John Bates for the District of Columbia has ruled that Postal Investigators who were investigating identity fraud must be disclosed.  The main reason for the Court's finding is that the agency failed to provide anything more than a conclusory statement in its declarations when asserting the employee's privacy rights, which were then outweighed by the public interest finding that these individuals may be needed to testify in a civil suit.

More on White House Visitor List Release

The Reporter's Committee for Freedom of the Press has this on the White House Visitor List Release.  More releases are expected in the near future.

Class Action FOIA Complaint Filed

The Pearl Project Center for Public Ingtegrity has filed a class action FOIA complaint in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia challenging the policy of the FBI/EOUSA/DOJ to require either a privacy waiver or proof of death before they will process a request forrecords concerning foreign nationals. This includes obvious cases such as General Manuel Noriega and known terrorists. The plaintiff's believe that the requests need to be processed and the balancing of the public's interests vs. the individuals' privacy interests need to be weighed before exemptions are then asserted.

This may be the first, or at least one of the first, attempts at making a whole class plaintiffs in the action. 

The problem that brought the lawsuit is that the components of the Department of Justice sued will just close a FOIA request when information on a known foreign national such as the terrorists who killed Danny Pearl citing their privacy rights rather than processing the request. 

A copy of the lawsuit can be seen here:  Download Complaint - FINAL10.30.09[1] 

White House Releases Visitor Lists

The White House made its firs release of its visitor lists today according to the Huffington Post, which includes a link to the list.

Detainee Photo Battle Ends

MSNBC is reporting that President Obama has signed the bill that exempts the detainee photo battle from release under the photo.  There is good and bad in this.  In my opinion, the bad is that the photos that demonstrate government misconduct aren't released to the public.  The good is the Supreme Court doesn't get the chance to broaden exemption 7(F) and that the underlying opinions ruling that these photos aren't exempt under the FOIA pursuant to the exemptions tried by the government stand and can be applied to different situations (which I hope, as an American do not occur).

FOIA Ombuds(wo)man Discusses Plans for Office

OMB Watch has this article highlighting the Office of Government Information Services Director's plans for the Office.  Better known as the FOIA Ombudsman, Miriam Nisbet is reaching out to the FOIA community as she starts the Office which is a component of the National Archives and Records Administration.  Today, she is speaking at a luncheon with the American Society of Access Professionals ("ASAP").