Steve M has started a new discussion on your group: Everyones Plan B Subject: Guess What the Most trasparent White House in history did ( without telling you)? Most transparent White House ever rewrote the FOIA to suppress politically sensitive docs By Mark Tapscott, Washington Examiner Its Sunshine Week, so perhaps some enterprising White House reporter will ask press secretary Jay Carney why President Obama rewrote the Freedom of Information Act without telling the rest of America. The rewrite came in an April 15, 2009, memo from then-White House Counsel Greg Craig instructing the executive branch to let White House officials review any documents sought by FOIA requestors that involved White House equities. That phrase is nowhere to be found in the FOIA, yet the Obama White House effectively amended the law to create a new exception to justify keeping public documents locked away from the public. A serious breach The Greg memo is described in detail in a new study made public today by Cause of Action, a Washington-based nonprofit watchdog group that monitors government transparency and accountability. How serious an attack on the publics right to know is the Obama administrations invention of the White House equities exception? FOIA is designed to inform the public on government behavior; White House equities allow the government to withhold information from the media, and therefore the public, by having media requests forwarded for review. This not only politicizes federal agencies, it impairs fundamental First Amendment liberties, Cause of Action explains in its report. Equities are everything The equities exception is breathtaking in its breadth. As the Greg memo put it, any document request is covered, including congressional committee requests, GAO requests, judicial subpoenas and FOIA requests. And it doesnt matter what format the documents happen to be in because, according to Greg, the equities exception applies to all documents and records, whether in oral, paper, or electronic form, that relate to communications to and from the White House, including preparations for such communications. Forget making FOIA deadlines The FOIA requires federal agencies to respond within 20 days of receiving a request, but the White House equities exception can make it impossible for an agency to meet that deadline
Posted on: Tue, 18 Mar 2014 16:01:11 +0000
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