Free Republic

A U.S. Department of State office called Global Engagement Center deliberated at length on how to respond to reporters asking about its funding of a group that tries to convince advertisers to shun predominantly conservative publishers, with the goal of starving them out of business. The details that GEC staff discussed, however, are being kept secret and away from the prying eyes of the press and public. Heavily redacted documents were obtained this week by former Education Department lawyer Hans Bader as result of his Freedom of Information Act suit in the District of Columbia federal court against the State...

On Thursday, 2024 GOP Presidential Candidate Vivek Ramaswamy announced his intentions to file a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request against the Biden Department of Justice (DOJ). He made this announcement outside the courthouse where former President Donald Trump is set to be arraigned later today. Ramaswamy’s Twitter statement on Thursday was impassioned and clear: “The reason the people don’t trust the government is that the government doesn’t trust the people. I’m here at the courthouse where Trump will be arraigned later today & I’m making a demand to our government: tell us the truth about what’s really driving this...

The U.S. Secret Service has responded to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request by refusing to hand over details of its investigation into the cocaine found in the White House. The FOIA request, for a list of people possibly involved in the White House cocaine incident, was filed by the Heritage Foundation. The Secret Service rejected the request by claiming that such records are outside its authority. The Heritage Foundation filed a FOIA request after the Secret Service found “no suspects” and closed the investigation into the cocaine discovery in mid-July. The FOIA request seeks the list of hundreds...

FIRST ON FOX: The Secret Service will not say why they changed their position regarding a government watchdog's records request into Hunter Biden’s gun investigation records. Government watchdog Judicial Watch filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request in April 2021 regarding the gun reportedly owned by Biden and disposed of in a dumpster in 2018. The Secret Service initially told Judicial Watch that they had located records related to their inquiry, but a year later in October, after a September FOIA lawsuit by the government watchdog organization, the presidential protection agency changed its tune. Judicial Watch was told by...

The Daily Signal has been able to get 217 pages from the National Security Administration (NSA) under FOIA. Those pages show the huge effort to “torpedo” the Trump administration before they even took office with an effort to go after Gen. Michael Flynn, the man who would be National Security Advisor for President Donald Trump.Flynn’s conversation with the Russian ambassador in the period between November 2016 and Jan. 2017 was intercepted by intelligence officials for the Obama administration, and then his name was unmasked.The Signal requested the information in March 2021 and didn’t get the documents until June 30, 2023.Some...

As I understand it, using a personal email to conduct government business is not exactly kosher. Doing it to avoid accountability is definitely forbidden. Telling others to hide their correspondence on government business is Hillary Clinton-level malfeasance. That, my friends, is exactly what the Senior Advisor to Anthony Fauci did during the COVID pandemic. As you would expect, our “public servants” at the National Institute for Allergies and Infection Diseases want to make sure that we normies don’t have access to anything they don’t decide to tell us. ... Mr. Morens wanted to make sure that any discussion regarding the...

Republican presidential candidate and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy announced his campaign has filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) demand upon the Department of Justice (DOJ), according to a June 12 Tweet. Former President Donald Trump’s indictment relating to his alleged mishandling of classified documents was unsealed Friday. He is to be arraigned in Miami on Tuesday. Ramaswamy’s request asks for any records held by the DOJ in relation to Trump’s indictment. He calls out U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland and DOJ Special Council Jack Smith. My campaign just filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) demand to uncover *exactly* what...

Ron DeSantis always makes a big deal about signing all of the Florida laws that stem from new legislation the people behind his administration submit from his office. However, when he signed the new law that sealed all his travel records [Previously Discussed Here], he did so quietly. .... Snip.... Ron DeSantis ’24 is 100%, guaranteed to be an absolute construct of the billionaires, multinationals, and hedge fund managers who must stop Donald Trump and the America First platform. Look backward at the professional Republican outcomes in 2018, 2020 and 2022 to see the background of what this is all...

Judicial Watch announced that, as of March 31, the National Archives has released only 1,276 pages of over 8,000 records about the unprecedented document dispute and raid on the home of former President Trump. Click here or here to review the records.The records were released as the result of Judicial Watch’s August 2022 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed in after the National Archives and Records Administration unlawfully failed to respond to a February 2022 FOIA request (Judicial Watch v National Archives and Records Administration (No. 1:22-cv-02535)) for:

Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody is suing two federal agencies for failing to respond to Freedom of Information requests filed over a year ago. The FOIA requests relate to a Biden administration program that allegedly used taxpayer money to purchase crack pipes for drug addicts, she said. In February 2022, Florida sent FOIA requests to the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services asking for records about the use of federal grant funds being used to promote drug use through safe smoking kits, some of which reportedly included crack pipes and other drug-related paraphernalia. Over...

The agency's emails, obtained by a Freedom of Information Act request, show that officials were aware Williams did not meet the statute's requirements, but they explored how to circumvent it. The government watchdog Protect the Public's Trust published records Thursday that appear to show how Interior Department officials explored ways to circumvent a statute in the nomination process for Martha Williams as the director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service because she did not appear to have the "scientific education" required under the statute. Before she was sworn in to lead the agency in March 2022, Williams served as...

Through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, intrepid journalists at The Epoch Times have uncovered a previously secret CDC program to tag and track unvaxxed and “undervaccinated” (apparently meaning people who took one or more shots but did not get their so-called “boosters”) U.S. citizens. Via The Epoch Times (emphasis added):Medical codes introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic to show when people are unvaccinated or undervaccinated for COVID-19 are being used to track people, the top U.S. public health agency has confirmed.The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) made the confirmation in emails that The Epoch Times obtained through...

After several executive agencies in the Biden administration were sued for refusing to comply with Freedom of Information Act requests from conservative advocacy group Citizens United over the White House’s attempt to federalize elections, the Department of the Interior’s (DOI) Bureau of Indian Affairs finally turned over its first batch of requested documents. There’s one problem: More than half of the 54-page document is completely redacted. “The Biden administration is the least transparent in history, and these absurd redactions are just the latest example. What are they trying to hide from the American people?” Citizens United President David Bossie told...

[H/T Combat_Boots](Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced that it filed an opposition to the U.S. Capitol Police’s (USCP) effort to shut down Judicial Watch’s federal lawsuit for January 6 videos and emails. Through its police department, Congress argues that the videos and emails are not public records, there is no public interest in their release, and that “sovereign immunity” prevents citizens from suing for their release.Judicial Watch filed a lawsuit under the common law right of access after the Capitol Police refused to provide any records in response to a January 21, 2021, request (Judicial Watch v. United States Capitol...

It is no secret that American higher education is in crisis due to a lack of affordability, growing irrelevance, and the ideological conformity that prevails in today’s classrooms. Less well-known is the pervasive foreign influence, particularly from authoritarian countries, on today’s college campuses. China has its Confucius Institutes (CIs) to project soft power, while Middle East Studies Centers (MESCs) can also facilitate foreign influence. Little from these programs supports American values of natural rights or freedom of thought. In fact, these programs can pose actual national security threats. The National Association of Scholars’ (NAS) work in documenting foreign influence has...

When Katie Thoms learned that Fern Hill Elementary School teachers had undergone training to instruct K-5 students about gender identity, she felt disheartened. “It’s inappropriate,” she said. “This subject matter is sensitive, and it should be discussed with children and their families. It’s also a distraction from the focus on education and what the school’s mission is really supposed to be.” Thoms, who lives in West Goshen Township, is the mother of a 10-year-old boy named David in the 4th grade at Fern Hill Elementary School. She monitors his schoolwork for signs of LGBT influences. “My husband and I ask...

Biden’s National Archives Hides 99% of Records About Trump RaidIt isn’t surprising that the Biden administration is scrambling to hide its abusive machinations.The latest: The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is releasing only 65 out of more than 1,600 pages of records related to the Biden administration’s unprecedented raid on the home of former President Trump.We’re seeking the records in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit we filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after NARA failed to respond adequately to a February 2022 request (Judicial Watch v National Archives and Records Administration (No. 1:22-cv-02535).We’re...

EXCLUSIVE: FDA Withholding Autopsy Results on People Who Died After Getting COVID-19 VaccinesThe U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is refusing to release the results of autopsies conducted on people who died after getting COVID-19 vaccines. The FDA says it is barred from releasing medical files, but a drug safety advocate says that it could release the autopsies with personal information redacted. The refusal was issued to The Epoch Times, which submitted a Freedom of Information Act for all autopsy reported obtained by the FDA concerning any deaths reported to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System following COVID-19 vaccination. Reports...

The United States Postal Service has been monitoring protesters around the country for anti-gun and ant-Biden activity, according to newly unearthed intelligence assessments. Postal inspectors tracked the activities of gun rights activists in Virginia and far-right groups making their way to Washington, D.C. to protest President Biden's election, according to documents obtained by the Cato Institute. Cato obtained heavily redacted records through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request that laid out postal inspectors' spying from September 2020 to April 2021, including their covert social media surveillance through a program called Internet Covert Operations Program (iCOP).

Judicial Watch filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit this week seeking answers from the Secret Service related to the Hunter Biden gun incident in Delaware four years ago. The conservative legal advocacy group filed its initial FOIA request in March 2021, just after reports emerged about a handgun belonging to President Joe Biden’s son getting thrown in the trash near a Delaware high school in October 2018 by his sister-in-law Hallie Biden, with whom he was in a romantic relationship. The Secret Service has denied any involvement in responding to the incident, and after the agency declined to hand...