Holder Asks Court to Stop Document Release on Fast and Furious

[sailingaway]

Attorney General Eric Holder and his Department of Justice have asked a federal court to indefinitely delay a lawsuit brought by watchdog group Judicial Watch. The lawsuit seeks the enforcement of open records requests relating to Operation Fast and Furious, as required by law.

Judicial Watch had filed, on June 22, 2012, a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request seeking all documents relating to Operation Fast and Furious and “specifically [a]ll records subject to the claim of executive privilege invoked by President Barack Obama on or about June 20, 2012.”

The administration has refused to comply with Judicial Watch’s FOIA request, and in mid-September the group filed a lawsuit challenging Holder’s denial. That lawsuit remains ongoing but within the past week President Barack Obama’s administration filed what’s called a “motion to stay” the suit. Such a motion is something that if granted would delay the lawsuit indefinitely.

Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said that Holder’s and Obama’s desire to continually hide these Fast and Furious documents is “ironic” now that they’re so gung-ho on gun control. “It is beyond ironic that the Obama administration has initiated an anti-gun violence push as it seeking to keep secret key documents about its very own Fast and Furious gun walking scandal,” Fitton said in a statement. “Getting beyond the Obama administration’s smokescreen, this lawsuit is about a very simple principle: the public’s right to know the full truth about an egregious political scandal that led to the death of at least one American and countless others in Mexico. The American people are sick and tired of the Obama administration trying to rewrite FOIA law to protect this president and his appointees. Americans want answers about Fast and Furious killings and lies.”

The only justification Holder uses to ask the court to indefinitely delay Judicial Watch’s suit is that there’s another lawsuit ongoing for the same documents – one filed by the U.S. House of Representatives. Judicial Watch has filed a brief opposing the DOJ’s motion to stay.

As the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform was voting Holder into contempt of Congress for his refusal to cooperate with congressional investigators by failing to turn over tens of thousands of pages of Fast and Furious documents, Obama asserted the executive privilege over them. The full House of Representatives soon after voted on a bipartisan basis to hold Holder in contempt.

There were two parts of the contempt resolution. Holder was, and still is, in both civil and criminal contempt of Congress. The criminal resolution was forwarded to the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Ronald Machen–who works for Holder–for prosecution. Despite being technically required by law to bring forth criminal charges against Holder, under orders from Holder’s Department of Justice Machen chose to ignore the resolution.

http://beforeitsnews.com/alternative/2013/05/holder-begs-court-to-stop-document-release-on-fast-and-furious-2646610.html?utm_campaign=&utm_source=http%3A%2F%2Ft.co%2FQkqv4niBCd&utm_content=beforeit39snews-floatingtoolbar&utm_term=http%3A%2F%2Fb4in.info%2Ff4cC&utm_medium=twitter

[HOLLYWOOD]

Imagine that... one of world's top criminals in gun running, doesn't want anyone to know he's doing it. :rolleyes:

Obama going to have the employees working that federal court handling the case... phones tapped and IRS audited?

[Warlord]

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/79/Bundesarchiv_Bild_183-S72707,_Heinrich_Himmler.jpg/245px-Bundesarchiv_Bild_183-S72707,_Heinrich_Himmler.jpg

They don't call him Himmler Holder for nothing!

[timosman]

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/01/judge-rejects-obamas-executive-privilege-claim-over-fast-and-furious-records-217970



The Justice Department's own public disclosures undercut the president's privilege claim, Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled.
By JOSH GERSTEIN 01/19/16 01:16 PM EST

A federal judge has rejected President Barack Obama's assertion of executive privilege to deny Congress access to records pertaining to Operation Fast and Furious, a gunrunning probe that allegedly allowed thousands of weapons to flow across the border into Mexico.

U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled Tuesday that the Justice Department's public disclosures about its response to the so-called "gun walking" controversy undercut Obama's executive privilege claim.

"There is no need to balance the need against the impact that the revelation of any record could have on candor in future executive decision making, since any harm that might flow from the public revelation of the deliberations at issue here has already been self-inflicted," Jackson wrote. "The Department itself has already publicly revealed the sum and substance of the very material it is now seeking to withhold. Since any harm that would flow from the disclosures sought here would be merely incremental, the records must be produced."

Jackson said she wasn't questioning the propriety of Obama's claim of privilege, but ruling that the claim could not be sustained in view of other information the Justice Department had released on the topic, chiefly an Office of Inspector General report released in September 2012.

"This ruling is not predicated on a finding that the withholding was intended to cloak wrongdoing on the part of government officials or that the withholding itself was improper," the judge wrote.

The standoff over the records led to a House vote in June 2012 holding then-Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress for failing to turn over the records. The House later initiated a lawsuit to try to force disclosure of the files. The case was repeatedly delayed in an unsuccessful effort to broker a settlement.

The administration initially asked Jackson to throw out the suit altogether, arguing that the legislative and executive branches should use their own methods to sort out the dispute. However, the judge ruled in 2013 that the fight was an appropriate one for the courts to resolve. She also rejected the administration's efforts to appeal the case at that time, before she issued a definitive ruling.

Jackson, an Obama appointee, left open the possibility in her ruling Tuesday that some of the disputed records could still be held back from Congress because they contain sensitive information on law enforcement techniques, implicate foreign policy concerns or discuss matters covered by attorney-client privilege.

The administration could appeal the ruling. Asked about the decision at a regular briefing for reporters Tuesday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest had no immediate comment.

A Justice Department spokeswoman said solely that the agency was "reviewing the decision."

[Weston White]

So, the DOJ argued to brainwash the judge into thinking about executive privilege in a vastly different way. Really, can you just imagine the irony of that?

[Ronin Truth]

Whatcha got buried in there, Eric?