FOIA News: Chief FOIA Officers Council Meeting Showcases the Use of Advanced Technologies in FOIA

Chief FOIA Officers Council Meeting Showcases the Use of Advanced Technologies in FOIA

Office of Information Policy, Dec. 14, 2023

The Chief FOIA Officers (CFO) Council met virtually on November 9, 2023.  Associate Attorney General of the United States Vanita Gupta welcomed attendees, thanked agencies for their work on FOIA reporting, and highlighted the new Search Tool on FOIA.gov that will improve the public’s ability to search for previously released FOIA records and to identify appropriate agencies for new FOIA requests.  In previewing the agenda, the Associate Attorney General highlighted the use of technology such as artificial intelligence (AI) to increase automation in record processing as an emerging and promising area, but emphasized the importance of ensuring that there is sufficient human monitoring and that appropriate safeguards are established so that the government is operating consistent with our obligations under FOIA.  Deputy Archivist Debra Steidel Wall from the National Archives and Records Administration also welcomed attendees and emphasized the importance of FOIA as a crucial part of ensuring transparency and accountability.

Read more here.

FOIA News: High on Exemption 5

HHS Releases Highly Redacted Rescheduling Letter to DEA: An Analysis of Exemption 5 to FOIA

By Agustin Rodriquez et. al., Troutman Pepper, Dec. 12, 2023

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The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently drew the ire of transparency advocates when it heavily redacted a recommendation letter to the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) concerning the rescheduling of cannabis,[3] citing Exemption 5 as justification.[4] This decision has prompted questions about the appropriate use of redactions in FOIA requests, as redactions have become a battleground for debates over the balance between necessary secrecy and the public’s right to government information. In this blog post, we will discuss Exemption 5 of FOIA and evaluate its applicability to HHS’s redaction of the bulk of the rescheduling recommendation letter.

Read more here.

FOIA News: Artificial intelligence takes on FOIA exemptions

On December 10, 2023, the journal Artificial Intelligence and Law published a paper describing “a novel deliberative-language detection model . . . , the FOIA Assistant, that ingests documents responsive to an open-records requests, suggests passages likely to be subject to deliberative language, privacy, or other exemptions, and assists analysts in rapidly redacting suggested passages.”

See more here.

FOIA News: FOIA Advisory Committee meeting

The Freedom of Information Act Advisory Committee met for seventh time during the 2022-2024 term on December 7, 2023. Meeting materials are available here. A video of the remote meeting, which ran for three hours, is available here.

Court opinion issued Dec. 5, 2023

Chohan v. U.S. Dep't of State (D.D.C.) -- ruling that agency properly relied on Exemption 3, in conjunction with 8 U.S.C. § 1202(f) (Immigration & Nationality Act), to withhold records pertaining to agency’s denial of plaintiff’s visa applications.

Summaries of all published opinions issued since April 2015 are available here.

FOIA News: DoD Finalizes Amendments to FOIA Regulations

The Department of Defense published a rule in the Federal Register amending its FOIA regulations. The rule goes into effect on January 4, 2024 and DoD “determined that public comment is unnecessary before finalizing these amendments as they are administrative and are internal to DoD and the management of DoD's FOIA Program.”

Court opinion issued Nov. 29, 2023

Roland v. DOJ (7th Cir.) -- affirming district court’s ruling that: (1) before filing suit, plaintiff failed to administratively appeal DOJ’s determinations that neither the FBI nor National Security Division had records of spying on plaintiff through his television set, and that any existing records would be classified, in any event; (2) plaintiff’s claim about the existence of responsive records was “implausible,” dismissing plaintiff’s reliance on certain video recordings of television broadcasts as unrealistic.

Summaries of all published opinions issued since April 2015 are available here.

Court opinion issued Nov. 28, 2023

Huddleston v. FBI (E.D. Tex.) -- concluding that: (1) the FBI failed to justify its reliance on Exemption 7(D) and 7(E) to withhold information from the images of Seth Rich’s personal laptop; (2) FBI failed to show that records concerning Seth Rich’s work laptop were not “agency records,” rejecting the use of the four-factor Burka test and adopting the Ninth Circuit’s opinion in Rojas v. FAA; and (3) FBI properly withheld newly found records concerning the work laptop pursuant to Exemption 7(A), citing a criminal prosecution and governmental action against various Russian nationals who have been indicted by a grand jury in the District of Columbia.

Summaries of all published opinions issued since April 2015 are available here.

Court opinion issued Nov. 27, 2023

Judicial Watch v. DOJ (D.D.C.) -- ruling that FBI performed an adequate search for records of communications between FBI officials and the New York Times regarding search warrants executed in 2021 against certain Project Veritas employees; rejecting plaintiff’s challenges to the search terms employed and the locations searched, as well as plaintiff’s “pure speculation” that the FBI was the source of the newspaper’s reporting.

Summaries of all published opinions issued since April 2015 are available here.

FOIA News: Peace Corps to amend FOIA regulations

The Peace Corps plans to revise its FOIA regulations as set forth in a proposed rule published in the Federal Register on November 28, 2023. Comments must be received by December 28, 2023.