Court Says FOIA’s Exemption 5 Protections for “Inter-Agency” Communications Don’t Apply to Foreign Agencies The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the FOIA’s Exemption 5 – the oft-abused “deliberative process” exemption that allows the government to withhold inter and intra-agency communications – does not apply to communications with foreign agencies. In the case, Lucaj […]
Washington, DC, March 11, 2017 – Three out of five of all federal agencies are flouting the new law that improved the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and required them to update their FOIA regulations, according to the new National Security Archive FOIA Audit released today to celebrate Sunshine Week.
Houston, We Have a Problem if 3 out of 5 Agencies Ignore New FOIA Law Three out of five of all federal agencies are flouting the new law that improved the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and required them to update their FOIA regulations, according to the new National Security Archive FOIA Audit released to […]
ProPublica Uses FOIA to Win List of 100s of Trump Hires FOIA requests from ProPublica have, along with a list of names provided by the Office of Personnel Management, won the release of more than 400 names of Trump administration hires that have been installed across the government, “providing the most complete […]
Body Cam Footage Won through FOIA Shows Tucson Police Shoving 86-Year-Old Woman to Ground at Immigration Protest Police body camera footage obtained from a FOIA request submitted by Tucson News Now shows a Tucson Police Department officer shoving an 86-year-old-woman to the ground at a National Day without Immigrants protest on February 16. The video […]
FOIA Request Reveals Anwar al-Awlaki’s Role in Failed 2009 Bombing A federal judge’s order that the FBI conduct a line-by-line review of documents on radicalized American imam Anwar al-Awlaki’s role in an attempted 2009 airline bombing forced the agency to release hundreds of historically significant pages. The documents were initially requested by New York Times […]
Scottish FOI Releases Shed Light on Local Law Enforcement Dealings with Trump Team Scottish police have released 49 documents in response to FOI requests on “its dealings with Trump International Golf Links Scotland (TIGLS) since 2009.” The Ferret reported that the FOI documents show concerns with private security hired by Trump and worry “that the […]
The National Security Archive and the Project on Government Oversight are distributing a survey for both FOIA processors and FOIA requesters on how agencies conduct searches. The goal of the survey will be to collect data on disparate agency search methods and software – and the more people who fill it out, the more useful the […]
By Swetha Kareti, @swethak13 The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is the only cabinet level agency that was able to meet President Obama’s 2009 instruction to reduce FOIA backlogs by 10 percent per year. Out of the 15 federal departments surveyed, HHS reduced its backlog by 12.7 percent* per year. The average for all federal departments was an 8.21 […]
Regulations Undercut OGIS’ Role as Go-To FOIA Experts The Office of Government Information Services has published a proposed rule change to its regulations in the Federal Register. A part of its Dispute Resolution Services section – Dispute resolution process, Section 1291.14 section g – appears problematic. The section states: OGIS issues a final response letter […]