Today, our firm filed an amicus brief on behalf of Citizens United in an appeal challenging the Biden Administration’s withholding of agency reports in violation of the Freedom of Information Act. President Biden issued Executive Order 14019 on March 6, 2021, directing every executive branch agency to provide a report to the White House on ways that those agencies can “promote voter registration and voter participation.” The Biden Administration has argued that all of those agency reports are exempt from disclosure under FOIA pursuant to the presidential communications privilege.
Our amicus brief argued that the agency reports are not exempt because they are not provided to the White House as advice to the president, but simply as a report of the plans of those agencies to the president’s staff. We also argued that the EO 14019 and the agency reports do not relate to the president’s core Article II powers but rather are related to the election matters which the constitution vests in Congress and the states. Our brief explained the context of EO 14019 being used to politicize the federal government to operate as a tool of the DNC, and FOIA should not be used to conceal these actions from the public.