Jonathon Berman, jonathon.berman@sierraclub.org
Washington, DC -- Today, the Sierra Club took the Interior Department to court to hold it accountable for its failure to respond to basic Freedom of Information Act requests within the timeline required by law, or even to provide estimates of when such requests may be addressed.
The Interior Department under disgraced former secretary Ryan Zinke and continuing under Acting Secretary David Bernhardt has failed to provide documents which would shed light on all of their meetings and conversations. In July, the Sierra Club submitted requests under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) seeking records of the external communications and calendars of Zinke’s schedulers, in September for Assistant Secretary of Land and Minerals Management Joe Balash which oversees the Bureau of Land Management, and Bernhardt’s in January.
Zinke and Bernhardt have consistently sought to hide their meetings and withhold information regarding who they’ve met with and why, with Bernhardt going so far as to insist that he doesn’t keep a calendar.
“David Bernhardt, Ryan Zinke, and Joe Balash’s delays and refusal to even meet basic legal requirements are unlawful and unjustifiable,” said Sierra Club Senior Attorney Joshua Smith. “The American people deserve transparency, and they have a right to know which corporate polluters -- including former clients -- Acting Secretary Bernhardt and former Secretary Zinke have met with to sell out our public lands. The Sierra Club will hold the Interior Department accountable to ensure the public knows the truth.”
The Department is legally required to provide the Sierra Club a response within 20 working days of receiving the requests with determinations about whether it would comply with the requests, and to promptly begin producing responsive documents. Now, more than eight months after the first request was submitted, the Interior Department has yet to provide a determination about whether it will comply with Sierra Club's requests, or even give an estimate about when it will have a determination, let alone produce any responsive records -- an unexcused delay that violates the Department’s clear FOIA obligations.
The Sierra Club's difficulty in getting transparent answers from Bernhardt and Zinke’s Interior Department is part of a pattern, which includes the department having sought to “clamp down” on public records requests.
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About the Sierra Club
The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with more than 3.5 million members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person's right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.