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“The Circuit Court for the District of Columbia has ruled that the Department of Justice must release information regarding government surveillance of cell phone location data. The American Civil Liberties Union had filed a Freedom of Information Act request for information regarding current and past cases where the Department of Justice had accessed cell phone …
Obama Administration Fulfills Some Open Gov Goals, National Security Bureaucracy Hinders Progress – “The Obama Administration has made some positive changes towards an open government this year, but the national security bureaucracy continues to hinder progress, according to a report released today. The 2011 Secrecy Report was released by OpenTheGovernment.org, a coalition of more than …
“Freedom House launched a special report, Promise and Reversal: The Post-Soviet Landscape Twenty Years On, to mark the 20th anniversary of the failed Soviet coup of August 19, 1991. A retrospective essay examining changes in the state of political rights and civil liberties in the former Soviet Union over the last two decades, as well …
“The Department of Justice has published a FOIA Contacts Listing on the FOIA.gov website. The listing was updated on August 1, 2011. The Developer Resources Page hosts a listing of FOIA contacts across federal departments and agencies.” [Michael Ravnitzky] Download the full FOIA contacts list, in xls – here (updated as of 8/01/2011)
Privatization of GPO, Defunding of FDsys, and the Future of the FDLP, by jajacobs “On July 22, the House passed a bill that would remove funding for FDsys, reduce funding for GPO by 20%, and reduce funding for the Superintendent of Documents by 16% (Kelley). The House Report on the bill also directs the Government …
DOJ News release: “After reviewing the Chief FOIA Officer Reports, OIP has prepared an assessment of the progress made by the Executive Departments in implementing the President’s FOIA Memorandum and the Attorney General’s FOIA Guidelines. The fifteen Departments account for nearly 80% of all FOIA requests processed by the government. Those Departments were scored on …
News release: “Pursuant to a FOIA lawsuit filed by the National Security Archive on the 50th anniversary of the infamous CIA-led invasion of Cuba, the CIA has released four volumes of its Official History of the Bay of Pigs Operation. The Archive today posted volume 2, “Participation in the Conduct of Foreign Policy” (Part 1 …
ACLU news release: “Today, were releasing a report, Drastic Measures Required: Congress needs to Overhaul U.S. Secrecy Laws and Increase Oversight of the Secret Security Establishment…we lay out the scope of the problem and analyze its unfortunate consequences for the operation of our government, for our national security, and for our democracy at large. The …
“Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services today said it placed its ‘AAA’ long-term and ‘A-1+’ short-term sovereign credit ratings on the United States of America on CreditWatch with negative implications. The CreditWatch action reflects our view of two separate but related issues. The first issue is the continuing failure to raise the U.S. government debt ceiling …
“Forty-five years after President Johnson signed the U.S. Freedom of Information Act into law in 1966, federal agency backlogs of FOIA requests are growing, with the oldest requests at eight agencies dating back over a decade and the single oldest request now 20 years old, according to the Knight Open Government Survey by the National …
Via Project On Government Oversight (POGO): “Taxpayers were massively overcharged in dozens of transactions between the Army and Boeing for helicopter spare parts, according to a full, unredacted Department of Defense Office of Inspector General (DoD OIG) audit – that POGO is making public for the first time. The overcharges range from 33.3 percent to …
The Freedom of Information Act on its 45th anniversary | Commentary – July 01, 2011: “Lyndon Johnson opposed FOIA said it was a plot against his administration but a tenacious backbencher from California, John Moss, had pursued it for 12 years and LBJ finally relented, signing the legislation on July 4th, 1966. Here …
