Free Republic

Note: I know this article is a little older, but it is breaking news because of the new developments going on in his case. The Federal Judge, that is very strict against Pro Se filers that don't have an Attorney, has granted Brian's requests in his complaint and seems to be working towards Brian possibly being able to prove in Federal Court that the U.S. Attorney Office has engaged in possibly criminal behavior of obstruction of justice.WASHINGTON - April 27, 2017 - PRLog -- Brian D. Hill, formerly of USWGO Alternative News, has decided to sue the U.S. Department of...

Conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch is suing the Justice Department for emails that could reveal what former acting Attorney General Sally Yates knew about alleged connections between Russia and the Trump administration. Judicial Watch filed the lawsuit Friday under the Freedom of Information Act, Politico reported, when Yates already was scheduled to testify Monday before the Senate on alleged connections between President Donald Trump’s campaign and transition team and Russia.

Judicial Watch today announced a court hearing will be held on Monday, May 1, 2017, regarding Judicial Watch’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit seeking emails “relating to official United States Government business sent to or from” former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson and three other top Homeland Security officials who used “non-‘.gov’” email addresses

Deep State Watch – JW Sues EPA for Records from Encrypted App We Warn 11 States to Clean Voter Registration Lists or Face a Lawsuit JW Sue the ATF for Records on AR-15 Ammo ‘Armor-Piercing’ Ban Gorsuch Confirmation a Victory for Constitutional Government Deep State Watch – JW Sues EPA for Records from Encrypted App The administrative deep state – the legions of unelected, entrenched bureaucrats in Washington – thinks it doesn’t have to answer to an elected president, the rule of law, or the American people. We are now seeking to uncover the truth about the particularly notorious...

Full title: Judicial Watch Sues EPA for Communications Records of Officials Who May Have Used Cell Phone Message Encryption App to Thwart Government Oversight Suit seeks to determine whether officials used software app known as “Signal” to secretly send and receive official messages (Washington, DC) — Judicial Watch today announced it filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit for communications sent or received by EPA officials who may have used the cell phone encryption application “Signal” to thwart government oversight and transparency. The suit was filed in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia ( Judicial...

We continue to undercover the details of the Obama IRS’s arbitrary and capricious behavior toward those presumed to be “enemies” of President Obama. Last week we released 695 pages of new documents containing admissions by IRS officials that the agency used “inappropriate political labels” to screen the tax-exempt applications of conservative organizations. Other records reveal that the IRS was going to require 501(c)(4) nonprofit organizations to restrict their alleged political activities if they opted for “expedited consideration” of their tax-exempt applications. The documents were produced after a revelation by the IRS that it had located “an additional 6,924 documents of...

Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland bent over backward to protect White House visitor logs from disclosure, transparency advocates say, leading to their concern about his approach to the law. The Obama administration has disclosed some White House visitor records as a matter of policy since 2009, but in 2013 the White House won a major appeals decision from Garland that disclosure is not legally necessary under the Freedom of Information Act.

The FBI has been bad about processing FoIA requests for years now. It’s about time somebody did it, even if it’s the goofy cat-video website Buzzfeed. I’m talking about suing the Federal Bureau of Investigation which is apparently violating federal law by failing to process Freedom of Information Act (FoIA) requests in a timely manner. In this case Buzzfeed wants the FBI file for the late Andrew Breitbart and hasn’t been getting it.

JW Testifies to House Oversight Committee, Visits WH New Clinton Emails Reveal More Mishandling of Classified Information, Favors for Donors Protecting Election Integrity in North Carolina Supreme Court Battle JW Testifies to House Oversight Committee, Visits WH It was my privilege to testify last week on behalf of Judicial Watch before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, which was meeting to hear testimony on several bills that would improve government transparency. The complete hearing is available here . You can read all of my prepared remarks here . But let me share with you a few key...

We hear it all the time from politicians: They are finally going to stop the “waste, fraud, and abuse” in government. In states with more corruption, like Pennsylvania, New York, or Illinois, calls to clean up government are frequent as well. The problem is that these promises rarely come to fruition. This week—Sunshine Week—is a perfect time to stop waiting for someone else to fix these problems. Let’s look to citizens, and a push for more open government, to get the job done. As the saying goes, sunlight is the best disinfectant of all.

The government watchdog group Judicial Watch has filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the Department of Justice (DOJ) seeking all records its has on the June 27, 2016 meeting between President Bill Clinton and then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch in her airplane, a meeting that occurred while the FBI was investigating Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server, a potential national security crime. The airplane meeting took place on the tarmac at the Phoenix Harbor International Airport, several days before Hillary Clinton was interviewed by the FBI. Several months after the gathering, Lynch told the media that...

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration in its final year in office spent a record $36.2 million on legal costs defending its refusal to turn over federal records under the Freedom of Information Act, according to an Associated Press analysis of new U.S. data that also showed poor performance in other categories measuring transparency in government. For a second consecutive year, the Obama administration set a record for times federal employees told citizens, journalists and others that despite searching they couldn’t find a single page of files that were requested. And it set records for outright denial of access to files,...

An Associated Press analysis of new U.S. data finds the Obama administration in its final year spent a record $36.2 million on legal costs defending its refusal to turn over federal records under the Freedom of Information Act. The Obama administration also set a record -- for a second consecutive year -- for times federal employees told citizens, journalists and others that despite searching they couldn't find a single page of files that were requested.

The IRS has told a federal court that they've recently identified almost 7,000 more documents that could contain information on how the agency targeted the tax-exempt applications of Tea Party organizations or other conservative political groups starting back in 2010, according to a court document. But IRS in the document would not commit to a timeline for releasing the documents. The revelation of thousands of unreleased documents was made in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit from Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group that specializes in filing, and in many instances litigating, FOIA requests. For Judicial Watch President...

California Supreme Court Says Emails And Texts on Officials' Private Accounts Are Public RecordsGovernment employees in California cannot keep the public from seeing their work-related emails and texts sent on personal devices and through private accounts, the state's Supreme Court ruled unanimously Thursday, closing a loophole that justices said could have allowed the "most sensitive and potentially damning" communications to be shielded. With the ruling, California joins a growing list of states that treat public business done through private accounts as public records. "This ruling is a model for giving government transparency laws meaning in the digital age," said Matthew...

Lawmakers in California have filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to look into the activities of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the state, the Huffington Post reported Friday. According to the report, the request was filed in order to retrieve “information about recent Department of Homeland Security policies and Immigration and Customs Enforcement activities.” The measure was filed by two Democratic lawmakers, Senate President Pro Tem Kevin De Leon and California Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, who argue that transparency is crucial to many California residents. “When the safety of Californians is at stake, we must demand greater...

Top lawyers who helped the Obama White House craft and hold to rules of conduct believe President Donald Trump and his staff will break ethics norms meant to guard against politicization of the government — and they’ve formed a new group to prepare, and fight. United to Protect Democracy, which draws its name from a line in President Barack Obama’s farewell address that urged his supporters to pick up where he was leaving off, has already raised a $1.5 million operating budget, hired five staffers and has plans to double that in the coming months. They’ve incorporated as both a...

Conservative foundation Judicial Watch is planning to sue several government agencies if they do not hand over records related to the wiretapping of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. The group filed Freedom of Information Act requests for the records weeks ago but are planning to sue by next week for the records if they do not receive anything by then. Judicial Watch filed the requests with the FBI, NSA, CIA, and Treasury Department, according to the group’s Director of Investigations and Research Chris Farrell. The group is aiming to find out whether there was ever a warrant allowing the...

Perhaps the subject of the terror attack on the US consulate in Benghazi will become more academic than political after the 2016 election denied Hillary Clinton the presidency. For now, though, documents continue to emerge that contradict the narrative created by Hillary and the Barack Obama White House about the nature of the attack. Yesterday, Judicial Watch received 54 more pages from its FOIA lawsuits and came across a bombshell buried in them. Notes of a State Department briefing for Congressional aides on the day after the attack show Undersecretary Patrick Kennedy acknowledging that the attack was not a...

The University of Michigan has not delivered documents requested from it in a Freedom of Information Act request despite depositing a check over a month ago. On Nov. 16, 2016, the Mackinac Center for Public Policy filed a FOIA request to the university regarding certain emails of U-M President Mark Schlissel. The university’s FOIA office received the request the next day, then on Nov. 28 requested a 10-day extension allowed under state law. On Dec. 12, the university said a full response to the FOIA request would cost $126 for 2.75 hours of labor. The Mackinac Center paid the university...