Free Republic

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,...

une 30, 2016 Today, as we approach the 50th anniversary of the Freedom of Information Act, President Obama has signed into law the FOIA Improvement Act of 2016. In our democracy, the FOIA serves as a vital tool to keep citizens informed about the operations of their government. Since its enactment in 1966, the FOIA has been amended on a number of occasions to adapt to the times and changing priorities. The FOIA Improvement Act of 2016 contains several substantive and procedural amendments to the FOIA, as well as new reporting requirements for agencies. In order to assist agencies in...