Secrecy and FOIA
Sep 24, 2020 | Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., September 24, 2020 - When White House lawyers tried to block publication of former National Security Adviser John Bolton’s book, The Room Where it Happened, a National Security Council classification specialist confronted them, suggesting they were only intervening "because the most powerful man in the world said that it needed to happen,"
Jun 25, 2020 | Briefing Book
Washington, DC, June 25, 2020 — Portions of a long-secret government blueprint for expansive surveillance of domestic protest movements during the Nixon presidency have just been released, more than 50 years after it was drafted. The notorious “Huston Plan” prepared by representatives of the White House and the U.S. intelligence community envisioned a smorgasbord of covert operations that made even FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover queasy. The proposed activities ranged from monitoring domestic dissident groups — notably the Black Panthers — to office break-ins.
Jun 19, 2020 | News
Washington, D.C., June 19, 2020 – As President Trump escalates attempts to quash publication of former National Security Adviser John Bolton’s book, The Room Where it Happened, on the grounds that it still “contains classified information,” the National Security Archive today posted documentation on previous cases of “prepublication review” dating back to the 1970s that cast doubt on the admi
May 18, 2020 | News
Washington, D.C., May 18, 2020 – The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals today ruled against the National Security Archive’s lawsuit to restore the routine disclosure, under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), of the White House visitor logs that were taken down by the Trump administration in early 2017.
Jan 13, 2020 | Blog Post
Unredacted Ukraine Emails Cast Doubt on Exemption 5 Invocation A recent Just Security article from Citizen and Responsibility for Ethics in Washington’s (CREW) Anne Weismann provides a powerful argument for reforming FOIA Exemption 5, often called the “withhold it because you want to” exemption, “to mirror how the deliberative process privilege is treated in the […]
Dec 13, 2019 | Blog Post
Rumsfeld Memos Play Key Role in “The Afghanistan Papers” Donald Rumsfeld’s “snowflakes” – memos that the former Secretary of Defense was as fond of sending subordinates as President Trump is of tweeting – play an important role in the Washington Post’s massive exposé on the Afghanistan war, The Afghanistan Papers. The series draws on both […]
Nov 18, 2019 | News
Washington, D.C., November 18, 2019 – The Historical Archive of the National Police of Guatemala (AHPN) is in trouble. This unparalleled collection of Guatemalan police records, renowned throughout the hemisphere and across the world, limps along in a drastically reduced state.
Nov 5, 2019 | News
Washington D.C., November 5, 2019 - The National Security Archive, together with Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), sued Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the Department of State today for violating the Federal Records Act by failing to create and preserve essential State Department records (see the complaint). The legal team representing the plaintiffs in the case is led by Anne We
Oct 4, 2019 | News
Washington D.C., October 4, 2019 — U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson yesterday ordered the White House to preserve all records relating to meetings and phone calls with foreign leaders, as well as all records on White House practices and policies for creating and keeping such records.
Oct 2, 2019 | News
Washington, D.C., October 2, 2019 – The Justice Department has pledged that the White House will preserve records of President Trump’s conversations with foreign heads of state while a federal judge considers a lawsuit under the Presidential Records Act (PRA).