The White House is removing a federal regulation that subjects Office of Administration, which is in charge of archiving emails, to the Freedom of Information Act, claiming that court rulings find its office is not subject to the transparency law.
This comes on the heels of Hillary Clinton’s scandal where she stored years of state emails on her private server.
The exemption of the Office of Administration from the FOIA is listed in the Federal Register as a final rule, meaning that there will be no opportunity for public comment.
The timing of this removal brought some questions to the transparency advocates because it was on National Freedom of Information Day and during the debate over the preservation of Obama administration records. And it’s Sunshine Week, a week where news organization and watchdog groups bring issues of government transparency to the forefront.Anne Weismann of the liberal Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington said:
“The irony of this being Sunshine Week is not lost on me.”
For 30 years, the Office of Administration has responded to FOIA requests. Until the Obama administration, groups on the left and right used the records to shed light on how the White House works.
“This is an office that operated under the FOIA for 30 years, and when it became politically inconvenient, they decided they weren’t subject to the Freedom of Information Act any more.” Tom Fitton from Judicial said.
CREW sued over e-mails that were deleted by the White House.
A federal appeals court in Washington ruled that the Office of Administration was not subject to the FOIA in 2009.
The appeals court ruled the White House would be required to archive the e-mails and not release them to the FOIA. Now the White House e-mails must be released under the Presidential Records Act, that will be five years after the end of the administration.
The rule change makes it so there will not be a formal process for the public to request the White House voluntarily disclose records. These records include the White House visitor logs.
The White House didn’t say why it waited almost six years to acknowledge the court ruling of regulations.
Brandi Hoffine, a White House spokeswoman says that the administration remains committed to work towards unprecedented openness in government. She stated:
“Over the past six years, federal agencies have gone to great efforts to make government more transparent and more accessible than ever, including by making information available to the public via our Open Government initiative and improving the FOIA process.”
Rick Blum, coordinator of the Sunshine in Government initiative for the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press was not happy with ruling. He says the bigger issue is the that the Office of Administration is responsible for record-keeping. With the Clinton e-mail controversy, there should be more scrutiny of the record-keeping practices he thought.
“I think what we’ve all learned in the last few weeks is the person who creates a record–whether it’s running a program or writing an e-mail–is the one who gets to decide whether it’s an official record,” Blum said. “And there ought to be another set of eyes on that. That’s the essential problem.”
almost time 2do like iraquis/u don t lie cheat then steal our $$ 4 your pleasure, GTFO of office oscum@$$ mafia!
hey Barrak why do you think it’s called the White House?
People, this goes way beyond politics. This is about Obama wanting to hang on to the White House and control the American people. It’s about one world order. It goes back farther than any of us can even remember, and it has been planned from way back then. It isn’t a conspiracy theory anymore, it’s reality. I am very well aware of how crazy this sounds, so please don’t ask me to check my tin-foil hat because I’m not wearing one, and I assure you I have never needed one. Look for any and all information you can find about the closed Walmarts in our country, and many others and you will find out that these Walmart’s have been turned into jail cells fully equipped with chip machines and guillotines. They all have tunnels drilled beneath them and and they lead to the FEMA camps, which are actually death camps. The dumbing-down of America was not an accident, it was set up on purpose so that people will not realize what is going on or guess what has been going on behind the scenes. The clintons and the Obamas have been closely associated for a very long time. Look up George Soros and see what you can find out about him. He’s been a long time want to be dictator, and he is behind the shadows of our government right now dictating it all. Obama has the UN, and much of our own military, (because it is no longer #our military – it is a military filled with his assassins) set to turn against us if we rise up against him and his government gurus. That’s why they’re all about trying to take our guns away. Since Obama has not succeeded in doing that, he’s been traveling to all these different countries and doing his best to make them hate us even more than they already do, because he wants America under his thumb. He’s infiltrated these other countries with his assassins in order to weaken their economies, and destroy their people, and make them more dependent on the One World Government. He has given Iran nuclear power and everything they need for instructions on how to use it intentionally, and he has revealed where our nuclear stockpiles are, to pretty much anyone outside of our country who wants to know. These people sitting in our government right now, are all rotten to the core, and they #want to see us lose our country. THIS should help you all to understand now why the so-called refugees are all young men except for a few females and children that they brought for sexual reasons, and to help fool the American people into believing they were really refugees. Did you ever notice you don’t see any old Muslim ‘ refugees’? Obama’s ‘jv’ boys are here to take us out. They are planted in all of America’s largest cities in sects, and they are waiting for Obama to give the word, and in the meantime causing as much chaos as possible. All of the members of Congress who are a part of this, will all be gone in the middle of September through the end of October and perhaps even longer. I saw Obama’s calendar on line, and he is marked as being away all that time. They will be hidden away in their special bunkers they built for themselves so they will be safe while the rest of us are being slaughtered. While they are gone, our government will be run by a few special people they throw in until the chaos is over, or most of us are all dead, or contained. I will leave things at that for now, and let you make what you will of it. Look for it, read about it, you’ll see that some of the things you were so confused about, will start to make sense. If we rise up, Obama will call martial law ( he’s already written up the executive order for it ) and there will be people dressed in full riot gear coming to our doors to steal our guns, and haul us away.
Nothing. But a bunch of liers and traitor
IS THERE A JIG IN THE W.HOUSE.
Should be illegal to remove any government official from obeying the law. Trump gonna clean house and remove the scum
Fucking scumbags
Thats all that$#%&!@*does is coverup his illegal activities. .. Impeach that POS
Need to get him out now before he declares Marshall law, and then gets a third term.
This is very, very old news folks.