A number of agencies have posted their fiscal year 2020 annual reports online. See list below. Agencies were required to submit their reports to the Department of Justice by November 11, 2020. The agencies’ deadline for posting reports on their websites is March 1, 2021. DOJ will also post the reports here.
FOIA News (2015-2025)
FOIA News: Round-Up of Recent Stories
FOIA News (2015-2025)CommentBrian Kutner, CIA Can Shield Records on Syrian Rebel Funding, Courthouse News (Feb. 9, 2021)
Twitter may have banned former President Donald Trump, but his disruptive use of the platform is still being argued in court.On Tuesday morning, the D.C. Circuit sided with the CIA in a dispute involving a Freedom of Information Act request from BuzzFeed stemming from a Trump tweet.
2nd Cir. Says Judges Can Order Public Posting of FOIA Docs, Law360 (Feb. 5, 2021)
A split Second Circuit on Friday ruled that the Freedom of Information Act authorizes courts to order the public posting of hidden government documents — a victory for a legal service provider seeking the online publication of 750,000 immigration appeals decisions. In a precedential 2-1 decision, the appeals court revived New York Legal Assistance Group’s suit seeking to make available to the general public every unpublished, or nonprecedential, U.S. Board of Immigration Appeals decision issued since 1996, as well as any future ones.
(Article paywalled)
FOIA News: Dep't of Transportation releases annual FOIA report for 2020
FOIA News (2015-2025)CommentThe U.S. Department of Transportation appears to be the first cabinet agency out of the gate in posting its annual FOIA report for fiscal year 2020. DOT reported that it received 14632 requests during the year and that it processed 15433 requests, reducing the number of “pending” requests from 6368 to 5567. The number of “backlogged” requests— i.e., legally overdue—nevertheless rose from 3578 to 4272, a nearly 20 percent increase.
FOIA News: FOIA Project Analysis Shows Increasing Backlog of Pending District Court FOIA Decisions
FOIA News (2015-2025)CommentJustice Delayed Is Justice Denied: Judges Fail To Rule in a Timely Manner on FOIA Cases
By FOIA Project Staff, The FOIA Project, Feb 3, 2021
The latest case-by-case court records show that even after filing suits, FOIA requesters are facing longer and longer delays before their cases are decided. Indeed, the backlog of pending FOIA court cases is growing much faster than the increase in litigation because judges are failing to rule in a timely manner and allowing cases to drag on for years.
As of the end of FY 2020, the number of FOIA cases pending in the federal courts climbed to 1,683. This is more than three and a half times the number of pending cases ten years ago in FY 2010 when the pending court caseload was just 467.
Read more here.
FOIA News: Supreme Court petitioned to consider Clinton email case
FOIA News (2015-2025)CommentJustices Urged To Take Up Clinton Deposition Email Case
Law360, Feb. 2, 2021
A conservative watchdog is gunning to revive a case seeking to depose Hillary Clinton over her use of a private email server as secretary of state, telling the U. S. Supreme Court a D. C. Circuit panel erroneously overturned a trial court's discovery order and granted Clinton "extraordinary relief. " The 38-page petition for writ of certiorari docketed Monday emerged from Judicial Watch Inc. 's Freedom of Information Act suit, which demanded U. S. Department of State records relating to the 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya. The full circuit court's bench in October declined to reconsider a three-judge panel's August order releasing Clinton from deposition..
Read more here (accessible with free trial subscription).
See petition here.
FOIA News: EEOC to launch new FOIA software
FOIA News (2015-2025)CommentEEOC TO LAUNCH NEW FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOIA) SOFTWARE
Beginning Feb. 1, Requesters Can Initiate New FOIA Requests and Appeals Using New Tool
EEOC Press Release, Jan. 29, 2021
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) announced today that, effective Feb. 1, it will begin using a new software system (“the 2021 system”) to receive and process Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests and appeals, replacing the system it has used since 2015.
As part of EEOC's ongoing commitment to transparency and accountability, FOIA requesters will continue to be able to monitor their requests and appeals online and exchange correspondence and documents with EEOC electronically. While EEOC posts many agency documents on its website, and in its online FOIA public reference room, individuals can submit FOIA requests for other records.
Read more here.
FOIA News: OGIS Publishes COVID-19 FOIA Website Review Follow-up
FOIA News (2015-2025)CommentOGIS Publishes COVID-19 FOIA Website Review Follow-up
By C. Lemelin, Office of Government Information Services, Jan. 28, 2021
OGIS is pleased to announce publication of our latest report which examines whether agencies are following the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Information Policy (OIP) guidance encouraging them to post alerts on their websites indicating how the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting their FOIA operations. The results of this assessment, for which OGIS reviewed 305 agency and department FOIA websites, shows that 47 percent of the federal FOIA websites we reviewed alert requesters to changes in their FOIA processing due to the pandemic. Generally, agencies that receive a higher volume of FOIA requests are more likely to have COVID alerts on their FOIA websites than agencies that receive fewer FOIA requests. Read our report the findings and download the spreadsheet of our findings.
Read more here.
FOIA News: Gov't ordered to pay attorney's fees in PPP loan case
FOIA News (2015-2025)CommentBallard Spahr Wins $122K in Legal Fees in FOIA Suit Over PPP Loan Secrecy
The open records lawsuit ultimately forced the Trump administration to released detailed information about who received PPP loans.
By Nate Robson, Nat’l Law Journal, January 21, 2021
Ballard Spahr will receive $122,347 in legal fees for its work in an open records lawsuit that forced the U.S. government to release detailed information about who received hundreds of millions of dollars through a COVID-19 emergency loan program.
The law firm asked for nearly $154,842 in fees and costs, but U.S. District Judge James Boasberg of the District of Columbia on Thursday said Ballard Spahr failed to support its billing rates and hours worked, and subsequently shaved off nearly $32,000
Read more here.
FOIA News: Environmentalists seek FOIA reforms
FOIA News (2015-2025)CommentGreens push Congress for stronger FOIA protections
By Kevin Bogardus, E&E News, Jan. 15, 2021
Environmental groups, drawing from their battles for public records with the Trump administration, are calling on Congress to strengthen the Freedom of Information Act.
Fourteen green organizations, including the Center for Biological Diversity, Earthjustice, the Sierra Club and the Western Values Project, sent a letter yesterday to House and Senate lawmakers with recommendations on how to improve the more than 50-year-old transparency law.
Read more here (accessible with free trial subscription)
FOIA News: ICYMI, FOIA Project issues litigation study
FOIA News (2015-2025)CommentWhen FOIA Goes to Court: 20 Years of Freedom of Information Act Litigation by News Organizations and Reporters
FOIA Project, Jan. 13th, 2021
The news media are powerful players in the world of government transparency and public accountability. One important tool for ensuring public accountability is through invoking transparency mandates provided by the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). In 2020, news organizations and individual reporters filed 122 different FOIA suits[1] to compel disclosure of federal government records—more than any year on record according to federal court data back to 2001 analyzed by the FOIA Project.
Read more here.