Executive secrecy expands with unprecedented new memo
The U.S. classifies far too many secrets, obstructing democracy.
Excessive government secrecy takes many forms, from agencies needlessly claiming documents are classified to ignoring information requests and destroying records — even when the documents show government fraud or illegal conduct. This hinders a free press, effective oversight, and the public’s ability to self govern.
We need to fight for systemic improvements, and we need the press to vigorously question the government every time it says something is classified.
Featured Items
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FOIA Lawsuit No. 5: My Attempt to Access the Secret Report Claiming Snowden’s Leaks Could Damage National Security
Last month, Shane Harris published a report in Foreign Policy revealing that that the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) prepared a report and concluded Edward Snowden’s leaks and the news reports on the top-secret documents he disclosed could “gravely impact” national security. The Foreign Policy report quoted House Intelligence Committee Chairman …
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NSA Refuses to Confirm or Deny Whether It Has Documents on Spy Program It Already Talked About
I’m getting a kick out of the letters the National Security Agency (NSA) has been sending me in response to my Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.A couple of weeks ago, the NSA refused to release 156 pages of draft talking points the agency created in the wake of …
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This Method is So Constitutional, the DEA Won’t Even Release Its Name
Training documents released to MuckRock user C.J. Ciaramella by the Drug Enforcement Administration provide unprecedented details on the tactic known as “parallel construction,” by which agents reverse engineer evidence to hide surveillance programs from defense teams, prosecutors and a public wary of domestic intelligence practices. But the DEA redacted all …
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NSA Sees “Grave Damage” to National Security If Draft Talking Points on Surveillance Released
The National Security Agency appears to have spent a lot of time trying to agree on a set of talking points agency officials could use to respond to revelations that originated with Edward Snowden about the lawfulness of the agency’s classified surveillance programs.Indeed, last October, I filed a Freedom …
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DOJ: Feinstein’s Committee Controls Torture Report; Has Final Say Over Public Release
A report completed more than a year ago by a Senate panel that investigated the CIA’s torture program can only be released by the committee, which maintains complete "control” over the highly classified document, the Justice Department said in a court filing late Friday. The Justice Department made that claim …
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Highlights From Daniel Ellsberg’s Reddit AMA on Edward Snowden and NSA Surveillance
Pentagon Papers whistleblower (and our co-founder) Daniel Ellsberg held an expansive, seven-hour long Reddit “Ask Me Anything” session yesterday to explain why NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden will join our board of directors. He also discussed many other subjects—including NSA surveillance, President Obama’s flip-flop on whistleblowers, Nixon’s dirty tricks, and …
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Intel Committee Publishes Fact-Free Press Release About Secret ‘Damage’ Assessments of NSA Leaks
House Intelligence Committee chairman Rep. Mike Rogers and his Democractic counterpart Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger published a press release today touting a classified Defense Department report alleging that Edward Snowden’s leaks—and by proxy, stories published by news organizations—threaten national security and “are likely to have lethal consequences for our troops in …
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On Secrecy, Oaths, and Edward Snowden
These two pieces, the first by Marcy Wheeler, in part commenting on the second by Amy Davidson in the New Yorker (along with Snowden himself, in his interview with Bart Gellman) are the first I've seen making a point I've been making for years: contrary to the frequent …
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EXCLUSIVE: Clapper Memo Reveals Rationale Behind NSA Review Group Secrecy
When President Obama announced last August that he would take steps to try and win back public confidence in the wake of a series of troubling disclosures by The Guardian and Washington Post about the National Security Agency’s surveillance practices he promised the public that his administration would be “transparent." …
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How we crowd-sourced transcripts of the entire Manning court martial
On May 9, 2013, we made a bold claim on this website. We promised to crowd-fund enough money to hire independent court reporters to provide transcripts of the entire Manning court martial. We knew that it was vital that the public have a virtual seat in Chelsea Manning’s trial …
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