Investigative Reporter Jason Leopold Shares ‘Horror Stories’ in Getting the Government to Comply with FOIA Requests

VICE News investigative reporter Jason Leopold shared some “horror stories” about his difficulties in getting state agencies to comply with Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests with the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee today.

Leopold explained that many agencies drag their feet or outright refuse to hand over documents they’re ostensibly required to, sometimes with no explanation. Today at the Committee, Leopold testified:

Leopold: The Office of Net Assessment (ONA) is the Pentagon’s in-house think tank. They spend millions and millions of dollars putting together reports — reports that they contract out about perhaps some futuristic warfare, or what the situation in the Middle East is going to look like with regards to oil. I asked for those reports. I filed a FOIA request. They refused to comply with my FOIA request. They said it was too broad. I narrowed it, they still said it was too broad. I sued them. Recently they said that “We’ll give you some documents as long as you promise to never file a FOIA request again and don’t have anyone else file a FOIA request on your behalf.”

Rep. Mark DeSaulnier (D-CA): How is that legal?

Leopold: I don’t know, but they put this in writing, and I’m really looking forward to the day when I write this story up.

Leopold, who now humorously describes himself as a “FOIA terrorist” on his Twitter profile, said the reports he requested weren’t even classified.

“Not only will they not give up the reports, they can’t find the reports,” Leopold said.

Contributors at TruthVoice have also run into similar issues with FOIA requests. Earlier this year, Andrew Slanker, who is also a founding member of social commentary website Evading Justice, repeatedly filed FOIA requests in an attempt to find out which US police departments received MRAP armored vehicles following the US Department of Defense’s decision to donate $3.4 billion worth of surplus military equipment.

Slanker was unsuccessful, receiving vague “security concerns” in the responses he received from the Defense Logistics Agency.