all 2 comments

[–]magnora7 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Honestly I'm surprised FOIA became a thing at all in the first place. Seemed like one good point of progress in recent history. I guess I'm not surprised they're trying to shut it down, but again I'm surprised it got passed in the first place.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

"Justice Stephen Breyer, joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor, wrote that in order for the information to be exempted it must also "cause genuine harm to the owner's economic or business interests." "

https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/24/politics/foia-supreme-court-argus-leader/index.html

This case was about the department of agriculture not wanting to give out information on what stores accept food stamps. I can see how that info getting out could hurt stores. I wouldn't want to go to any that accept them. I think saying that out loud is unPC so the department of Agriculture didn't want to say it and just said the info is confidential. They didn't want to have to try and prove how it would be detrimental to the owners economic interests, although I bet it could be done. But this case does set another precedent weakening FOIA. It's a shame this had to be done for such a stupid PC reason.