In last week’s Senate oversight hearing for the Department of Justice, Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley asked Attorney General Eric Holder to explain how the Obama administration, so fervently committed in its rhetoric to government transparency, could have denied a greater percentage of Freedom of Information Act requests than under the secrecy-loving administration of George W. Bush. Join in with our transcription of the videocast at around minute 87 of the hearing:
Senator Charles Grassley: On January 21, 2009, President Obama issued a presidential memorandum to heads of all executive departments and agencies regarding Freedom of Information. That memorandum stated, “All agencies should adopt a presumption in favor of disclosure,” and then directed you to issue new FOIA guidelines which you issued March 19 of last year. Your guideline stated that “an agency should not withhold information simply because it may do so legally.” They also limited when the Justice Department would defend the denial of FOIA requests.
I believe the guidelines were a good step in opening up government and honoring President Obama’s pledge of transparency. However, when the Department posted the annual FOIA report back in March, the facts, I think, painted a very different picture. An analysis by the Associated Press found that in Fiscal Year 2009, government agencies cited FOIA exemptions 468,000 times compared to 312,000 times in Fiscal Year 2008. One exemption, B5, was used almost 71,000 times in Fiscal Year 2009 compared to 47,000 times in Fiscal Year 2008, and all of this occurred despite a total decrease in FOIA requests in Fiscal Year 2009.
These numbers, I think, ought to be shocking to to anybody that talks about transparency. I’m going to ask two questions. What is the reason for substantial increase in the use of FOIA exemptions by this administration? If the use of exemptions continue to increase in Fiscal Year 2010, what will you do to personally insure that agencies are more transparent and responsive to the public’s right to know, and to what the president says he wants his executive branch of government to do?
Attorney General Eric Holder: Yeah, the president has been clear, and I think in the regulations that I issued I was clear, that FOIA and the release of information, the desire for transparency, is something that is criticial to this administration. The statistics that you have cited are indeed troubling. I’m not exactly sure what the reason is, but I think it requires some further examination to ensure that those people who are responsible for making FOIA decisions are doing so in a way that is consistent with the desires of the President and the directions that I have issued. We will review that and see what has happened. I can assure you, though, that the president is sincere, I am sincere, in trying to make sure that we are responsive, or more responsive, to FOIA requests.
Thanks for playing Don’t-Answer-the-Question, Mr. Attorney General. You’ve won the Amana RadarRange! Although Eric Holder didn’t provide an informed answer to either of Chuck Grassley’s questions, the Attorney General did let us know that the Obama administration doesn’t have a grip on one of its a signature campaign issues.
what? sincerity isn’t enough?
an amana radar range? if holder would have known there were prizes he would have run that pony round a few more laps.
Sincerity wasn’t enough in the Bush years either, when the Republicans told America to relax about the whole civil liberties thing, the whole torture thing, and the whole evidence of WMD thing, because George W. Bush was a great guy and we should just trust in his sincerity.
I know (or think) you’re being sarcastic and have trouble with Holder on this too — I just wanted to spell it out.
yes, but, i love the “don’t answer the question” game. it’s being played all over town.