Free Republic

Conflict of interest disclosure reports filed by top federal officials were removed from public view by the Obama administration in recent months, a move that government transparency and accountability advocates condemn as a major setback. The Office of Government Ethics (OGE) reports are the primary tool that watchdog journalists, political activists and interested voters can use to guard against presidential appointees using their positions to enrich themselves or others.

At the Treasury Department, the memo came down from the deputy executive secretary, Wally Adeyemo, in December of 2009. Going forward, the memo stated, “sensitive information” requested under the Freedom of Information Act was to be reviewed not only by career FOIA officials but also by a committee of political appointees... before release. And it didn’t just happen at Treasury, but at the IRS and the Department of Homeland Security, too. Current and former FOIA attorneys at these agencies say documents requested by the media have come in for special scrutiny, called “sensitive review,” often holding up release for weeks...

While serving as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton’s email system was set up to foil FOIA requests, and the Associated Press is suing State to force them to turn over emails in their possession. Americans weren’t allowed to see Obama’s Internet plan that the FCC recently passed, the White House has booted reporters from meetings and the Correspondents Association has complained that the Obama administration offers the least access of any president.Given those examples and more, does the White House still consider itself an historic beacon of transparency?

A Canadian tech firm that has provided service to that country's single-payer health care system is behind the glitch-ridden United States national health care exchange site healthcare.gov. CGI Federal is a subsidiary of Montreal-based CGI Group. With offices in Fairfax, Va., the subsidiary has been a darling of the Obama administration, which since 2009 has bestowed it with $1.4 billion in federal contracts, according to USAspending.gov. The "CGI" in the parent company's name stands for "Conseillers en Gestion et Informatique" in French, which roughly translates to "Information Systems and Management Consultants." However, the firm offers another translation: "Consultants to Government...

THE PRESIDENT:  Good afternoon, everybody.  Tomorrow there’s going to be a very important vote in the Senate about how much influence special interests should have over our democracy.  Because of the Supreme Court’s decision earlier this year in the Citizens United case, big corporations –- even foreign-controlled ones –- are now allowed to spend unlimited amounts of money on American elections.  They can buy millions of dollars worth of TV ads –- and worst of all, they don’t even have to reveal who’s actually paying for the ads.  Instead, a group can hide behind a name like “Citizens for a...

We are all soooooo shocked On his first full day in office, President Barack Obama ordered federal officials to “usher in a new era of open government” and “act promptly” to make information public. As Obama nears the end of his term, his administration hasn’t met those goals, failing to follow the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act, according to an analysis of open-government requests filed by Bloomberg News. Nineteen of 20 cabinet-level agencies disobeyed the law requiring the disclosure of public information: The cost of travel by top officials. In all, just eight of the 57 federal agencies...

During a presidential campaign, there's no such thing as over-sharing. Barack Obama promised to run the most transparent White House in history—disclosing donations, shunning lobbyists, and broadcasting important meetings on C-SPAN. Transition captain John Podesta reiterated the point Tuesday when he said Obama's would be "the most open and transparent transition in history."

We're in the midst of what I think of as the patriotic season - Memorial Day's just behind us, Californians are voting in a primary election today, and Flag Day and Independence Day are just ahead. As a patriotic American - I love my country, support its enduring foundational principles, and defend those ideals with my words and deeds - this is one of my favorite seasons. But this year, sadly, I'm hesitant about displaying patriotic symbols, especially the flag. And I blame that on the faux patriotism of tea partiers.

Bob Secter and Andrew Zajac of the Chicago Tribune report that, while researching what went at Freddie Mac during the period White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel served on the government sponsored enterprise’s board of directors, they were unable to get minutes of board meetings and other information: The Obama administration rejected a Tribune request under the Freedom of Information Act to review Freddie Mac board minutes and correspondence during Emanuel’s time as a director. The documents, obtained by Falcon for his investigation, were “commercial information” exempt from disclosure, according to a lawyer for the Federal Housing Finance Agency....