For Journalists
AP encourages all news organizations to fight for freedom of information.

Getting answers is the essential work of a free press in a free society. As the trend toward government secrecy trickles down to the smallest town office and police department, the need for a free press and for telling the whole story has never been stronger.

Hear from Tom Curley.

As part of its news mission, AP works in three ways to assure that journalists have access to events, proceedings and information.

1. We assert our rights under federal and state constitutions and FOI laws to obtain access to news. Often we go to court to enforce those rights.

AP journalists regularly file applications for disclosure of documents covered by FOI laws. When applications are unlawfully denied, we appeal, and in some cases we sue to enforce our legal rights.

AP leads or joins efforts by news organizations to oppose the unlawful sealing of court proceedings, evidence, transcripts and court documents. Where AP isn’t part of the original effort, we often join “friend of the court” briefs in support of access efforts.

2. We monitor compliance by government agencies and officials with FOI laws and report infractions and shortcomings.

Where AP stories include information obtained by application under FOI laws, or where information for the story should have been disclosed under FOI laws but was not, AP reports this as part of the story.

AP participates in, and often leads, FOI Audit projects in which official compliance with FOI laws is systematically tested and the results reported in a package of stories published statewide.

3. We defend the statutory and constitutional rights of journalists to do their work free of government interference or intrusion.

AP opposes any subpoena demand for evidence that goes beyond material actually published or otherwise represents an unreasonable burden or intrusion on news operations.
AP vigorously protects, sometimes with litigation, any action by police or other news agencies in which reporters are unlawfully detained or interfered with, or news materials are seized.


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SUNSHINE WEEK 2011

Familiar barriers slow Obama's transparency drive

WASHINGTON (AP) — One government agency is still trying to find correspondence for a political reporter between federal officials there and prospective presidential candidates — from the 2008 election. Another censored 194 pages of internal e-mails about President Barack Obama's new rules on open government. Another agreed to hand over records of travel expenses then changed its mind and refused to turn them over.

Two years after Obama pledged to reverse the Bush administration's penchant for secrecy and comply more closely with the U.S. Freedom of Information Act, The Associated Press grapples with many of the same frustrating roadblocks and head-scratching inconsistencies. Several recent examples are described below. Exasperating delays and denials also affect ordinary citizens, researchers and businesses, and they frustrate the administration's goal to be the most transparent in history.

Top lawmaker protests 'whistle-blower' demotion

WASHINGTON (AP) — A leading House Republican warned the Obama administration on Thursday about demoting a federal worker who complained to her agency's internal watchdog that political appointees were interfering with records requests by journalists and others.

Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said the demotion at the Department of Homeland Security "appeared to be an act of retaliation." The committee is investigating the political reviews of records requests under the Freedom of Information Act.

Witnesses: Open records law still difficult to use

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. Freedom of Information Act remains an unwieldy and inefficient tool for obtaining government records despite President Barack Obama's promise to reinvigorate the law and improve his administration's transparency, experts told the Senate on Tuesday.

The Obama administration, meanwhile, said it has made significant progress since January 2009, when the president directed federal agencies to disclose more information rapidly and reduce their backlogs of requests for records by citizens, journalists, companies and others.

PROMISES, PROMISES: Little transparency progress

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two years into its pledge to improve government transparency, the Obama administration handled fewer requests for federal records from citizens, journalists, companies and others last year even as significantly more people asked for information. The administration disclosed at least some of what people wanted at about the same rate as the previous year.

People requested information 544,360 times last year under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act from the 35 largest agencies, up nearly 41,000 more than the previous year, according to an analysis by The Associated Press of new federal data. But the government took action on nearly 12,400 fewer requests.


Agencies struggling to meet Obama's order on FOIA

WASHINGTON (AP) — Dozens of federal agencies are struggling to meet President Barack Obama's 2-year-old order that requires the government to respond more quickly and thoroughly to request for records under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act, a study finds.

The report by the Washington-based National Security Archive determined that 41 of 90 federal agencies have yet to make concrete changes to their FOIA procedures under Obama's order. That's down from 77 one year ago, but still cause for concern half way through Obama's first term, said Eric Newton of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which financed the study. The archive is a public interest group that uses the law frequently to obtain federal records.