Missing White House Email Records Can Remain Secret, Judge Rules

WASHINGTON — A federal judge ruled Monday that a White House office that has records about millions of possibly missing e-mails does not have to make them public.

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly says the Office of Administration is not subject to the Freedom of Information Act, enabling the White House to maintain the secrecy of a lengthy internal paper trail about its problem-plagued e-mail system.

The decision came in a lawsuit filed against the administration by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a private group that has been trying to find out the extent of the White House's e-mail problems for more than a year.

The functions of the Office of Administration "are strictly administrative," Kollar-Kotelly ruled.

Kollar-Kotelly said the Office of Administration has no authority over others in the executive branch and that the office is exclusively dedicated to providing services to the Executive Office of the President.

Since its creation in 1978, the Office of Administration has responded to FOIA requests. But the Bush White House reversed that policy in August 2007 in the lawsuit filed by CREW.

Kollar-Kotelly's decision closes off one avenue of inquiry because while CREW is appealing, time is running out, with just seven months remaining in office for the Bush administration.

Still, the White House's legal problems over its e-mail system are not over. CREW and another private group, the National Security Archive, have sued the Executive Office of the President over the possibly lost e-mail, claiming that the EOP has failed to comply with legal obligations by failing to take steps to ensure preservation of electronic records.

In that case, a judge is considering whether to instruct the EOP on steps it must to take to safeguard electronic messages. The White Houes is seeking to have that suit thrown out.

The White House has acknowledged problems with its e-mail system, while saying that if any e-mail is missing, it can be found on disaster recovery backup tapes.

Comments

[darthdarcy]

Score one for Fascism, and you can thanks the Federalist Society for that..

[Hallucinocynic]

Rehnquist backed Kollar-Kotelly on her way up the judicial ladder. Not surprising that she would rule in the administration's favor.

[obamajusrocks]

That's one judge who needs to get his a$$ fired asap

[Tommygun264]

Can a federal judge be fired, or is it a life-time appointment, supposedly to insure against political corruption?

[RTIII]

Lifetime appointments can be dealt with in one of two ways:

They can be impeached by congress, or;

They can have the area of their jurisdiction removed. That is, they can be a judge of nothing, but still a judge and still getting their pay, pension, etc.

[GerryS]

her a$$

[Beachrunner]

Curses! Foiled again.

[ErnestineBass]

So which is it?

Are they missing...or merely secret?

Gawd...what a clusterfoink.

[FreedomCorpse]

Justice system has been out-to-lunch for 8 years....nothing new.

[pickleweedpete]

The ruling is total bullshit. Administrative of not, the records are public documents.

[amamomofsons]

I wonder whose pocket this Judge is in.

[realtalk]

Bush, I am sure he got a cut of the missing billions of our tax dollars which has disappeared on it's way to Iraq.

[Vinca]

TO realtalk: I SURE DO BELIEVE YOU ARE RIGHT

[sandgk]

She was appointed during the Clinton 2nd Administration in 1997 to District Court ...

"in May 2002 Chief Justice Rehnquist appointed Judge Kotelly to serve as Presiding Judge of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court , which is a 7-year appointment"

http://www.dcd.uscourts.gov/kotelly-bio.html

[Lemeritus]

Good point. Judge Kollar-Kotelly is a FISA judge, but there's really nothing outstanding in her career or appointments that would foreshadow a decision of this sort. 'Course, she does sit on the D.C. District, which I believe is innately conservative and from which, I think, Congress has been barred (by the President) from using to enforce their subpeona powers.

[GerryS]

she's channeling Renquist- he ain't dead

[GrainOSand]

The accomplice list for the war in Iraq:

The Bush inner circle
The Congress
The News Media
The Judicial System
The Supreme Court (they put the tyrant in power)
Paid, ambitious, zealots of invasion, occupation, and no-bid contracts
...and let us not forget that supreme enabler, the people.

Is the diagnosis that the disease is localized? No, the disease is systemic!

[vippy]

I am not surprised by this ruling. They all stick together with their criminal activities. Nothing new here.
And no matter how bad things get "impeachment" stays off the table. What a joke this country has
become.

[Vinca]

To Vippy: It ia a shame that we have to TOLERATE GW BUSH AND CHENEY WE SHOULD JUST PAY THEM TO BOTH GO TO TEXAS AND PUT UP THEIR FEET LET PELOSI TAKE OVER< THAT SURE WOULD BE A HELL OF A LOT BETTER THAN THEM

[larry278]

A question will this ruling hinder an Int'l Tribunal which tries W & cohorts for war crimes, etc or a US Court which tries W & cohorts for treason incident to their war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide, etc?
larry lynch

[DennyCrane]

That picture of Bush in front of the computer is priceless. He must be searching for stuff out on "the internets".

[isisdawnra]

And this is one more reason to scrape the dung out of Washington.

What kind of fool allows criminal behavior, from those who were to be held by a higher standard?!!!!

Bush and all his cronies .............

Have committed " High Treason"....based on crimes against the government and against the country.

I want to know............ "Why is this being allowed"??

[sophistwatch]

It is hard to imagine that this ruling will not be challenged given the known criminal activity associated with the outing of Valerie Plame, Gitmo, warrantless wiretapping and the deliberate misuse of intel as confirmed in the Senate Phase II report.

These emails could obviously shed light on known criminal conduct. This judge's ruling is dangerously close to obstruction of justice.

[crossuab]

This is ridiculous. What 's the purpose of having separations of powers? I'm am so tired of the Bush Administration desecrating the constitution. When is someone just going to do what is right regardless of the politics involved?

[isisdawnra]

And this is just one more reason to scrape the dung out of Washington.

What kind of fools allow criminal behavior from those who were to be
held to a higher standard.

Bush and his cronies.............are ALL Guilty of treason based on there actions , against government and against the country.

I want to know "Why is this being allowed"?