FOIA News: Sunshine Week is upon us

Sunshine Week Puts Spotlight on Accessing Government Information

Sunday marks the start of Sunshine Week, an effort to highlight the role of freedom of information at all levels of the U.S. government.

The week brings together a range of groups including media outlets, government officials, nonprofit organizations, schools, and libraries in an effort to promote and explain the importance of open government and how individuals and groups can access government data.

Kevin Goldberg, the legal counsel for the American Society of News Editors — the group that organizes Sunshine Week along with Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press — told VOA that one of the main goals for the week is to educate people on what it means to have an open government and why that is important.

Read more here.

Court opinion issued Mar. 7, 2019

Beagles v. DOL (D.N.M.) -- finding that: (1) plaintiff failed to administratively appeal withholdings from certain records concerning his former employer; (2) DOL properly withheld third-party information pursuant to Exemption 6; and (3) plaintiff was neither eligible nor entitled to attorney’s fees, despite agency’s five-year delay in adjudicating his administrative appeal.

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

Court opinion issued Mar. 6, 2019

Seife v. U.S. Dep't of State (S.D.N.Y.) - - ruling that: (1) State Department performed adequate search for “on background” press briefing transcripts produced by agency, but inadequately searched for joint press briefing transcripts produced by other agencies; and (2) agency’s reliance on Exemption 5 (deliberative process privilege) and Exemption 6 was proper in part and improper in part.

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

Court opinions issued Mar. 5, 2019

Citizens for Responsibility & Ethics in Wash. v. GSA (D.D.C.) -- determining that information about FBI’s headquarters building could not be withheld from agency’s “Findings and Determination” document pursuant to deliberative process privilege because the information was not pre-decisional.

Abakporo v. EOUSA (D.D.C.) -- ruling that government improperly relied on Exemption 3, in conjunction with Rule 6(e) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, to withhold “dates on which the term of the grand jury that returned an indictment against [plaintiff] was extended, as well as any court orders relating to those extensions.”

Jackson v. EOUSA (D.D.C.) -- concluding that agency performed reasonable search for records pertaining to plaintiff’s criminal case and that it properly withheld third-party information pursuant to Exemption 6.

Gizmodo Media Grp. v. FBI (S.D.N.Y.) -- deciding that FBI conducted adequate search for records about Roger Ailes, founder of Fox News, by performing index search of its Central Records System.

Cochran v. DHS (D. Md.) -- finding that FEMA conducted reasonable search for certain records pertaining to security clearance of plaintiff, a former FEMA employee.

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

Court opinions issued Mar. 4, 2019

McGehee v. DOJ (D.D.C.) -- determining that FBI performed reasonable search for records concerning the Jonestown Massacre and that it properly withheld records pursuant to Exemptions 1 and 7(C).

New Orleans Workers’ Ctr. for Racial Justice v. ICE (D.D.C.) -- ruling that government failed to perform adequate search for records concerning agency’s “Criminal Alien Removal Initiative, ” and that it failed to provide sufficient information to allow the Court to evaluate the propriety of its withholdings under Exemptions 5, 6, 7(C), and 7(E).

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

Court opinions issued Mar. 1, 2019

Pronin v. BOP (D.D.C.) -- determining that agency failed to adequately justify its searches and/or withholdings in response to plaintiff’s three requests for complete lists of names and titles of agency staff at three prisons.

Reporters Comm. for Freedom Press v. FBI (D.D.C.) -- holding that FBI improperly relied on Exemption 7(E) in refusing to confirm or deny records concerning its impersonation of filmmakers, reasoning that FBI’s investigative technique was well known to the public and that the effectiveness of FBI’s technique would not be impaired by confirming or denying existence of records.

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

Court opinion issued Feb. 28, 2019

Animal Welfare Inst. v. Nat'l Oceanic & Atmospheric Admin. (D.D.C.) -- finding that NOAA properly relied on attorney-client and work-product privileges to withhold draft legal memorandum concerning enforcement of permitting rules for orca whale known as Tilikum; noting that those privileges were not waived when NOAA shared memorandum with other agencies because they shared common legal interests.

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

Court opinion issued Feb. 27, 2019

Protect Democracy Project v. HHS (D.D.C.) — ruling that HHS failed to justify its use of the deliberative process privilege to withhold records concerning the discontinuation of advertising on government healthcare website, but that it properly withheld records pursuant to the attorney-client privilege.

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

Court opinion issued Feb. 26, 2019

Pena-Martinez v. DOJ (D.D.C.) -- finding that FBI did not justify Glomar response to request for alleged informant records because it failed to address facts indicating that the alleged informant testified as government witness during plaintiff’s trial and was referred to as an informant.

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

Court opinions issued Feb. 19, 2019

Krocka v. Exec. Office for U.S. Attorneys (D.D.C.) -- (1) reserving decision on whether agency performed adequate search for criminal records concerning plaintiff, because agency failed to “say the ‘magic words’ that it “searched all locations likely to contain responsive documents”; (2) finding that agency properly withheld records pursuant to Exemptions 3 (FRCrP 6(e)); 5 (attorney work-product); 7(C), and 7(D),

Brick v. DOJ (D.D.C.) -- ruling that FBI properly withheld records concerning Eleanor Roosevelt’s travel to Soviet Union pursuant to Exemption 3 (Nat’l Sec. Act of 1947) and Exemption 7(E).

Stein v. SEC (D.D.C.) — finding that SEC performed adequate search for records concerning plaintiff and that its reliance on Exemption 7(A) was proper because plaintiff’s criminal and civil cases were on appeal.

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