Political Quotes

“Mr. President, this week, the Nation commemorates Sunshine Week, a time to educate the public about the importance of open government. In recognition of Sunshine Week 2011, I am pleased to join with Senator Cornyn to reintroduce the Faster FOIA Act of 2011, a bill to improve the implementation of the Freedom of Information Act, FOIA. Senator Cornyn and I first introduced this bill in 2005 to address the growing problem of excessive FOIA delays within our Federal agencies. We reintroduced this bill in 2010, and the Senate unanimously passed it last year. This bill is the most recent product of our bipartisan work to help reinvigorate FOIA. This bill will establish a bipartisan commission to examine the root causes of agency FOIA delays and to recommend to the Congress and the President steps to help eliminate FOIA backlogs. While the Obama administration has made significant progress in improving the FOIA process, large backlogs remain a major roadblock to public access to information. A report released earlier this week by the National Security Archive found that only about half of the Federal agencies surveyed have taken concrete steps to update their FOIA policies in light of these reforms. In addition, twelve of the agencies surveyed by the National Security Archive had pending FOIA requests that were more than 6 years old, according to the report. Senator Cornyn and I believe that these delays are simply unacceptable. And that is why we are introducing this bill.…”