Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost’s office released the 2024 version of the state’s Sunshine Laws Manual this week.
The manual, commonly known as the Yellow Book, guides the state’s Public Records and Open Meetings laws.
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The Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) was aware of the issues with mail-in voting during the 2020 election cycle but censored social media narratives about the risks as alleged disinformation, according to agency documents.
CISA documents were released on Monday by America First Legal, showing the agency’s concerns about mail-in voting while it was also monitoring online opinions about such concerns.
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More than seven months after Audrey Elizabeth Hale’s murderous rampage at Nashville’s Covenant Presbyterian School, Governor Bill Lee says he remains “frustrated” by the lack of transparency from law enforcement officials.
But what has the governor actually done to help transparency along?
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A three-judge appeals court panel on Monday heard oral arguments in a First Amendment lawsuit seeking the release of the manifesto and related writings of the Covenant School killer.
The judges will determine whether a lower court erred in allowing Nashville’s Covenant Presbyterian Church, its elementary school and parents of students there to intervene in the lawsuit, brought by the parent company of The Tennessee Star, the Tennessee Firearms Association, The Tennessean, and others.
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Asking the court to “shield” Covenant Presbyterian School students from a “lifetime of abuse and harassment by the shooter from beyond the grave,” a new court filing lays out why parents of the children don’t want the Covenant killer’s manifesto and other writings made public.
Davidson County Chancellor I’Ashea Myles last week ruled that the Covenant Presbyterian Church, its private elementary school and the parents of the schoolchildren may intervene in a lawsuit seeking the manifesto and related writings of mass shooter Audrey Elizabeth Hale.
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Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed all-star panelist Roger Simon in studio to comment on the latest statements made regarding Metro Nashville Police Department Lieutenant Brent Gibson withholding Covenant Killer documents.
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The Tennessean on Wednesday followed The Tennessee Star and other organizations in filing a lawsuit against the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County demanding the release of the Covenant School killer’s manifesto and related documents.
The Nashville-based newspaper’s lawsuit comes nearly two months after Audrey Elizabeth Hale shot her way into the Covenant Presbyterian Scho
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Davidson County Chancellor I’Ashea Myles is reviewing the unredacted and proposed redacted journal and other writings of the Covenant School killer ahead of Thursday’s scheduled status conference meeting, sources with knowledge of the case tell The Tennessee Star.
Myles has scheduled a Show Cause hearing for June 8 on the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department’s refusal to turnover what has commonly been referred to as the “manifesto” of Audrey Elizabeth Hale, who stormed into Nashville’s Covenant Presbyterian School on March 27 and fatally killed three 9-year-olds and three staff members.
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Star News Digital Media Inc., parent company of The Tennessee Star, is suing the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County seeking the release of Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale’s manifesto.
The lawsuit, filed in Tennessee’s 20th Judicial District Court-Davidson County, follows on the heels of Star News Digital Media’s federal lawsuit demanding the FBI turn over the documents that law enforcement officials have kept locked away from the public for more than six weeks.
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The National Police Association has filed a lawsuit against the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County demanding the release of the Covenant School killer’s manifesto.
And The Tennessee Star has just learned that Tennessee 20th Judicial District Chancery Court Judge I’Ashea Myles has ordered a show cause hearing for May 11, examining whether the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department (MNPD) has failed to comply with public records laws.
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The Tennessee Firearms Association is asking a state court to order the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department to turn over the Covenant School killer’s manifesto — documents law enforcement have kept from the public more than a month after Audrey Elizabeth Hale stormed into the private Covenant Presbyterian School and killed three 9-year-olds and three adults.
In a lawsuit filed Monday, the TFA and former Hamilton County Sheriff James Hammond request the 20th Judicial District, Chancery Court, in Davidson County to grant the organization access to the manifesto. The complaint also seeks an order from the court finding the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County’s denial of TFA’s records requests is unlawful.
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A new bill from Arizona State House Speaker Ben Toma (R-Peoria), which involves the publication of election ballot images, passed through the House Municipal Oversight & Elections Committee Wednesday. State Sen. Ken Bennett (R-Prescott), a former Arizona Secretary of State, has a mirror bill in the State Senate and spoke in favor of Toma’s bill during the meeting.
“I don’t think this is a partisan issue. We have got to come together somehow as Republicans and Democrats in Arizona to make our elections transparent, trackable, and publicly verifiable,” Bennett said.
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The University of Washington is facing several public records requests in the wake of Just the News reporting on its Center for an Informed Public’s role in a Department of Homeland Security-backed private consortium intended to squelch purported election “misinformation.”
Nonprofit watchdog Protect the Public’s Trust filed two Washington Public Records Act lawsuits this week seeking to compel a faster UW turnaround for CIP Director Kate Starbird’s communications with other Election Integrity Partnership leaders and with outside participants, including government entities.
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It is National Sunshine Week, which celebrates transparency in government, including creating awareness about requesting information from governments through FOIA public record requests. In Arizona, there are two tools provided by state agencies which allow anyone to look online at some of the government spending by state and local governments. Although it is a minimal amount of data, it reveals some missteps and waste.
The Arizona State Treasurer manages AZCheckbook.com, which provides information about funding the state gets from all sources, including the federal government, and how much it is distributing to schools, cities, and towns. The Arizona Department of Administration operates OpenBooks.AZ.gov, which provides checkbook-level information about individual state expenditures, including on the city and county level.
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Indiana University paid a law firm to file a public records request against itself to search the emails of a law professor who was investigating its presidential search process, the professor claims, citing an invoice for the firm’s services.
Steve Sanders said he learned about the Access to Public Records Act (APRA) request made by Hoover Hull Turner, “presumably to attempt to find out how I’ve learned what I know,” on the eve of publishing his investigation on Medium in October.
The request covered any presidential search-related emails he may have sent or received with trustees, search committee members, former officials and recently departed President Michael McRobbie.
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AMinnesota school district billed a group $900,000 to fulfill a public records request about Critical Race Theory (CRT) in its curriculum.
A law firm representing parent group Equality in Education filed a records request with Rochester Public Schools in southern Minnesota to disclose materials mentioning CRT, the Daily Caller reported.
Wenyuan Wu tweeted: “Serious ask: is it normal for a Minnesota school district to ask $901k for a public records request on its CRT, DEI, SEL … practices?”
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Maricopa County Superior Court Judge John Hannah, who was appointed to the bench by former Gov. Janet Napolitano, ruled that the Arizona Senate must turn over records from the Maricopa County ballot audit to satisfy a public records request from The Arizona Republic. The newspaper and left-wing watchdog American Oversight have been engaged in litigation attempting to get records from the legislature and the contractor that conducted the audit, Cyber Ninjas.
Hannah said that while the legislature may keep conversations about legislation private, under “legislative privilege,” conversations about the audit are excluded. “This is not a confidential process,” Hannah said. “This is a highly, highly public process.” He said there is a legal presumption favoring disclosure which the Senate did not overcome.
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The Arizona Court of Appeals rejected a request from Cyber Ninjas, the company that audited Maricopa County’s ballots, to block a public records request by the media for records from the audit. Phoenix Newspapers Inc., which owns The Arizona Republic, asked for emails and other documents in its April request, which the lower trial court granted. Cyber Ninjas appealed the decision. The appellate court rejected the cyberfirm’s argument that opening its records up for public inspection would allow opening the records of any contractor that does business with the state.
Jack Wilenchik, Cyber Ninja’s attorney, expressed his disappointment to Capitol Media Services, “The government cannot force private contractors to produce things the government does not own. He said it’s similar to a violation of the Fourth Amendment protections against search and seizure.
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Recently-unearthed documents revealed a disagreement between the superintendent of Loudoun County Public Schools (LCPS) and the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office (LCSO), after the former requested increased security measures from the latter in order to combat protesting parents at school board meetings, the Daily Caller reports.
The correspondence was revealed by a public records request from the Fight for School PAC. Documents show that superintendent Scott Ziegler’s requests included an increased presence of officers, a K-9 sweep of the meeting venue, and undercover officers in the crowd, among other measures, all of which were rejected by LCSO as excessive.
The LCSO even went so far as to disagree with Ziegler changing the rules for the school board meeting, including the decision to shut down the public comment section of a meeting that took place on June 22nd; LCSO told Ziegler that measures such as this amounted to silencing political opposition.
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“Idon’t think parents should be telling schools what they teach,” Virginia Democratic gubernatorial nominee Terry McAuliffe said in a recent debate.
A wealthy Virginia school district outside Washington, D.C. went even further this week, with the help of a law firm tied to the former governor.
Represented by Hunton Andrews Kurth, Fairfax County Public Schools is suing two parents for learning about its dirty laundry from a state Freedom of Information Act request. It filed an emergency motion for a preliminary injunction Tuesday.
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The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio wants a court to force Republican lawmakers to turn over records related to redistricting it says it asked for five months ago and never received.
The group has filed a lawsuit in the Supreme Court of Ohio, seeking the records as the state closes in on the release of U.S. Census Bureau data and a constitutional mandate to redraw congressional and state representative district boundaries.
House Speaker Bob Cupp, R-Lima, and Rep. Bill Seitz, R-Cincinnati, have not responded to open records request made in February, the lawsuit said. The ACLU said the records will help it monitor the redistricting process.
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A Business Insider list of former President Donald Trump’s officials tracks where these figures are working since departing the administration, warning that like Trump, these former staffers are “nowhere close to being gone.”
Insider said it combed through the interviews, LinkedIn profiles, and public records of over 327 former Trump staffers and compiled a searchable database “to show where they all landed.”
The publication noted that almost 100 former staffers have obtained “establishment” jobs, that over 40 of these former Trump officials still work in the government or in politics, and that at least 85 have gone “off the grid with no information available about their next move.”
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One of Arizona’s largest newspapers is suing the state Senate and the contracted company running the audit, Cyber Ninjas, for access to their election audit records and financial records. The Arizona Republic, part of the Gannett mass media company, filed a special action on Wednesday in the Maricopa County Superior Court – case number LC2021-000180. Reportedly, the Senate denied the paper’s request for access to the audit and financial records, saying they weren’t public record. The specific information they hope to obtain includes the process for the audit, businesses involved, funding sources, and all communications of those involved.
The plaintiffs in the case are Phoenix Newspapers and Kathy Tulumello, news director for The Arizona Republic. Including the state Senate and Cyber Ninjas, the other defendants named are Senate President Karen Fann (R-Prescott), Senate Majority Leader Warren Petersen (R-Gilbert), and the secretary for the Senate, Susan Aceves.
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State Rep. William Lamberth has completely overhauled a public records bill that received significant public outcry to a version that creates increased government transparency. Rep. Lamberth (R-Portland), who is also the House Republican Majority Leader, initially drafted HB 0626 to protect government employees from abusive requesters. As The Tennessee Star reported, the original bill would limit public records access to as few as three requests per year, and that proposal was met with backlash on social media. While government watchdogs and media might have disagreed with the measure that may have appeared to be directed toward them, Leader Lamberth was requested to assist in dealing with a situation where certain records custodians in his district are being intimidated and harassed, an issue for which there is no current remedy. The five-page amendment that makes the bill seeks to balance public records requests that constitute harassment with improving the public’s access to basic government records. The most recent version of the proposed legislation would allow a public records custodian to pursue judicial relief from a public records requestor, with clear and convincing evidence that the records requests constitute harassment. The measure defines harassment as 12 or more public records requests to…
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