Via Email from Reporters Committee:
Hello,
As of today, August 1, 2023, iFOIA is retired. Thank you for more than 10 years of support!
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The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
On July 28, 2023, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence issued a final rule with proposed amendments to the agency’s Freedom of Information Act regulations, which were last updated in 2007. The proposed revisions are “due to organizational changes and subsequent amendments to the FOIA.” Comments are due on or before August 28, 2023.
The Freedom of Information Act needs to be modernized
By Curtis Schube & Gary Lawkowski, The Hill, July 24, 2023
In the past few weeks, the explosive contents of an email sent by former chief medical adviser and COVID guru Anthony Fauci, discussing the possible origins of COVID-19, have come to light. That email was part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) response from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Like many of the documents in the response, the CDC had completely redacted the email. The redaction rendered the response virtually useless despite it clearly being in the public interest. Only the action of the House Oversite Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic brought the contents of the email to light. It leaves one to wonder, is FOIA living up to its intended purpose?
Read more here.
The U.S. Trade Representative will update its FOIA regulations regarding expediting processing, according to a notice scheduled to be published in the Federal Register on July 25, 2023. Specifically, USTR will adopt two examples from DOJ’s guidance as to what qualifies as a “compelling need”: (1) the failure to obtain requested records on an expedited basis could reasonably be expected to pose an imminent threat to the life or physical safety of an individual; and (2) with respect to a request made by a person primarily engaged in disseminating information, there is urgency to inform the public concerning actual or alleged Federal Government activity.
Public comments will be accepted for 30 days from the notice’s publication date.
Daniel J. Metcalfe, who in 1981 co-founded the Department of Justice’s Office of Information and Privacy (now Office of Information Policy), has authored a 792-page book entitled Inside Justice: Secrecy at Work. Available this October, the book is described by its publisher as “at once a candid, highly readable memoir infused with sly humor, a deeply researched and argued call to action, and an unprecedented history of government secrecy that only one person could provide.”
Mr. Metcalfe left DOJ/OIP in 2007 after serving as its co-director for 24 years and as its sole director after Richard Huff retired in 2005. He shortly thereafter joined American University’s Washington College of Law and ran the school's Collaboration on Government Secrecy, which was an educational project devoted to openness in government.
Think Tank Accused of 'Sensationalism' in Prince Harry Drugs Lawsuit
By Jack Royston, Newsweek, July 13, 2023
Lawyers for the Biden administration have accused a conservative think tank of "sensationalism" in the latest salvo of their war of words about Prince Harry's drug use.
Harry described his use of cannabis, magic mushrooms, cocaine and ayahuasca in his memoir Spare, prompting the Heritage Foundation to ask the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to publish his U.S. visa application.
The foundation wants to determine whether the Duke of Sussex disclosed his experiences with illegal substances in the paperwork and, if so, whether he was treated with favoritism.
However, the administration has declined its requests, made under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).
Read more here.
The Freedom of Information Act was enacted on July 4, 1966, and became effective exactly one year later. For those interested in the evolution of the statute, which has been amended seven times, the legislative history is available on the Department of Justice’s website here.
DOJ, Prof Spar Over Secret Jones Day VW Emissions Docs
By Linda Chiem, Law360, June 27, 2023
The U.S. Department of Justice, Volkswagen and a Loyola Marymount University professor sparred in California federal court this week over whether a confidential Jones Day report on the German automaker's internal investigation into the 2015 emissions-cheating scandal should be made public.
The DOJ, Volkswagen AG and Lawrence P. Kalbers filed separate briefs Monday in response to questions from a court-appointed special master concerning whether Jones Day's investigative findings are protected from public disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act. The findings were shared with the government as part of grand jury proceedings.
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The case is Kalbers v. U.S. Department of Justice, case number 2:18-cv-08439, in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.
Read more here (accessible with free subscription).
Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta provided recorded remarks today at the American Society of Access Professionals’ National Training Conference in New Orleans. Ms. Gupta serves as DOJ’s Chief Freedom of Information Act Officer.
Why does the government keep obstructing UFO transparency efforts?
By John Greenewald, Wash. Exam’r, June 22, 2023
It's been nearly 27 years since I submitted my first Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA , request on UFOs . I was 15 years old at the time. That request unearthed a four-page Defense Intelligence Agency document detailing a 1976 event in which multiple UFOs shut off the communications and instrumentation panels of two separate Iranian F-4 Phantom jets. The advanced capabilities of these UFOs sparked my interest, and through the FOIA, I quickly discovered the incident was not an isolated one. I learned that there was much more to discover within official files.
My website, The Black Vault, showcases thousands of UFO files I've received from the government. The documents, overall, hint at a mysterious phenomenon the U.S. military and government have struggled to identify adequately for decades. Indeed, they appear to have often kept the public in the dark using various tactics to block legally or at least severely prohibit accessing some of these records that date back to the 1940s.
Read more here.