Andrea Billups, Human Events

After taxpayers bailed out the financial sector amid much public outcry last year, political and open-government observers are wondering how the Securities and Exchange Commission will now be allowed to skirt certain Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests under a new federal law.

Tucked inside a bill revamping the financial industry, signed by President Obama on July 21, is a provision that allows an exemption for the SEC to ignore certain FOIA requests. The FOIA dodge came to light when journalists from Fox Business Network discovered the SEC’s new public records loophole, an action the network’s attorney dubbed “a backroom deal that was cut between Congress and the SEC to keep the SEC’s failures secret.”

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By Don Loos, Big Government

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis is defiant and combative

On Friday, 20 November 2009, The National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation (Foundation) decided enough was enough and filed a complaint with the U.S. District Court demanding that they compel the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) to comply with the Foundation’s April 6th Freedom of information Act (FOIA) request.
The Foundation’s FOIA requested:

Records from communications and recorded events where specified Obama appointees and Big Labor official were present
Lists of lawsuits involving the Department of Labor and Deborah Greenfield within the past eight years.

List of any gifts received by Solis in the past 5 years from Big Labor or its officials

Specifically provide in detail (a) notes, (b) agreements, (c) communications, and (d) agendas related to the regulations related to the labor union and officer disclosure rules

Copies of phone logs

Copies of any notes or documents related to any enforcement of any labor laws and any outside groups such as labor unions, American Rights at Work, or ACORN

Obama’s Labor Department Ignores His Transparency Guidance
Remember January 21, 2009, when President Barack Obama proclaimed the new era of more open and transparent government began? This U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Information Policy memorandum is a good reminder:

On his first full day in office, January 21, 2009, President Obama issued a memorandum to the heads of all departments and agencies on the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The President directed that FOIA “should be administered with a clear presumption: In the face of doubt, openness prevails.” Moreover, the President instructed agencies that information should not be withheld merely because “public officials might be embarrassed by disclosure, because errors and failures might be revealed, or because of speculative or abstract fears.”

Agencies were directed to respond to requests “promptly and in a spirit of cooperation.”

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