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I've always wondered why when government receive documents from private entities (because of law, contracts, whatever) and that those documents are likely cover
by guerby 5y ago
I've always wondered why when government receive documents from private entities (because of law, contracts, whatever) and that those documents are likely covered by FOIA-like laws, they don't ask the private party to submit FOIA ready documents in addition to the full version. They could then automatically publish the FOIA ready part without having citizens ask a judge for it, the judges would just have to sample the non FOIA part.
- mike00632 5y agoSounds like an extreme amount of red tape, the same type of red tape that cost us hundreds of thousands of lives early in the pandemic.
- avs733 5y agoBecause then, when they got a FOIA request, the party submitting the request would inevitably challenge the redacted versions as over redacted. It isn't red light green light on words...your asking the judge to literally do the job that each department's FOIA folks are trained to do.
- elliekelly 5y agoThere’s a conflict of interest. If I’m prepping a document to be filed with the government I can’t redact in accordance with the government’s interests under FOIA and redact it in the best interest of my client. Or, to put it another way, would you want Monsanto or Philip Morris or Purdue Pharmaceuticals to “helpfully” redact documents on behalf of the government? It would largely defeat the purpose of FOIA.