Obama's Labor Department Ignores Freedom of Information Act

On Friday, 20 November 2009, The National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation (Foundation) decided enough was enough and filed a complaint with the U.S. District Court demanding that they compel the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) to comply with the Foundation’s April 6th Freedom of information Act (FOIA) request.

The Foundation’s FOIA requested:

• Records from communications and recorded events where specified Obama appointees and Big Labor official were present
• Lists of lawsuits involving the Department of Labor and Deborah Greenfield within the past eight years.
• List of any gifts received by Solis in the past 5 years from Big Labor or its officials
• Specifically provide in detail (a) notes, (b) agreements, (c) communications, and (d) agendas related to the regulations related to the labor union and officer disclosure rules
• Copies of phone logs
• Copies of any notes or documents related to any enforcement of any labor laws and any outside groups such as labor unions, American Rights at Work, or ACORN

Obama’s Labor Department Ignores His Transparency Guidance

Remember January 21, 2009, when President Barack Obama proclaimed the new era of more open and transparent government began? This U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Information Policy memorandum is a good reminder:

On his first full day in office, January 21, 2009, President Obama issued a memorandum to the heads of all departments and agencies on the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The President directed that FOIA “should be administered with a clear presumption: In the face of doubt, openness prevails.” Moreover, the President instructed agencies that information should not be withheld merely because “public officials might be embarrassed by disclosure, because errors and failures might be revealed, or because of speculative or abstract fears.”

Agencies were directed to respond to requests “promptly and in a spirit of cooperation.” The President also called on agencies to “adopt a presumption in favor of disclosure” and to apply that presumption “to all decisions involving [the] FOIA.” This presumption of disclosure includes taking “affirmative steps to make information public,” and utilizing “modern technology to inform citizens about what is known and done by their Government.”

(For more information about FOIA, visit the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Information Policy.)

Under any reading of the this memorandum, DOL is not following Obama’s orders. Why?…

DOL Gifts of Secrecy to Big Labor Bosses

So far, Obama’s Labor Department has rescinded regulations that required union bosses to disclose their forced-union-dues financed perks. The Obama Labor Department established an official policy of ignoring a regulation that requires disclosure of union boss conflict of interests. The Obama Labor Department set aside a court decision that would have provided teachers and other public employees much needed transparency; transparency teacher union bosses have fought since 2003.

As a long time political friend of Big Labor Bosses, Secretary Solis’ actions and many others came as no surprise to The National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation, which sent a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request in April to the Department of Labor (see video below).

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Solis is not only a close friend of Big Labor who voted for every union boss supported bill in congress; she was a treasurer for a Big Labor front group known as American Rights At Work (ARAW). In addition, the Labor Department now employs the radical former ARAW Executive Director Mary Beth Maxwell as a senior advisor to Solis.

But, the Foundation’s FOIA was not limited to Secretary Solis and her activities; it included a request for more information about the comings-and-goings of AFL-CIO lawyer and Obama appointee Deborah Greenfield. Greenfield cruised the halls of the Labor Department months before the Obama Administration officially began.

In her position on the Obama Organizing America Transition Team, Greenfield appears to have mapped out a plan to repeal regulations, ignore regulations, and stop court cases that undermine workers and benefit union bosses.

One Greenfield’s more shocking conflict-of-interest involves a lawsuit where Greenfield is one of the AFL-CIO’s named attorneys. The case formerly called AFL-CIO v. Chao, now AFL-v. Solis, is an attempt by Greenfield and the AFL-CIO to stop union boss conflict-of-interest reporting. And was has happened to the lawsuit since Greenfield has been at DOL? DOL made a side agreement (Joint Motion To Stay Proceedings) with the AFL-CIO to hold the suit until DOL has time to rescind the union boss conflict-of-interest report. Apparently, the Obama Administration sees no ethical dilemma here.

During January, Greenfield was one of only two Obama appointees at DOL; she reportedly assumed the role of the Secretary of Labor during this time. She was Executive Secretariat Director at the time.

Now, Greenfield remains Executive Secretariat Director while simultaneously serving as Acting Deputy Solicitor of Labor. With the Solicitor of Labor position unfilled, Greenfield is the defacto Solicitor of Labor as well.

From her current positions, Greenfield, read Big Labor Bosses, can influence every significant action that the DOL takes. Her positions provide her more than enough departmental power to shutdown the Foundation’s FOIA that remains unfulfilled. Hardly the most ethical administration Obama promised. It may even be time to FOIA Greenfield actions at DOL regarding her activities involving the Foundation’s original FOIA.

Clearly there is not transparency at here. Obama’s DOL has failed to fulfill his transparency directive. Its secretive behavior adds to the continuing failures of this Administration and Congress to comply with transparency and openness. It is likely there will be more fall out as seen after the Recovery Act documents were released. This Administration needs to be pushed to play by the rules and it is good to see groups like The National Right To Work Foundation and Rep. Darrel Issa and others finally begin to hold this Administration accountable.

To paraphrase Edmund Burke: All that is necessary for evil to prevail is for good people to do nothing. There need to be more FOIA suits and other lawsuits that challenge this Administration’s trampling of the Administration Procedure Act.