The most secretive White House

How does the government of the United States treat the press? Chris Deaton writes at The Weekly Standard,

This is an issue of constitutional law at the most fundamental level, and one of responsibility and transparency to the populace daily. It doesn't take a person of a particular politics to deny a public records request.

According to the Associated Press, the current White House set a record for it last year.

"In more than one in six cases, or 129,825 times, government searchers said they came up empty-handed last year. Such cases contributed to an alarming measurement: People who asked for records under the law received censored files or nothing in 77 percent of requests, also a record," it reported this month.

This covers requests from journalists and other private citizens through the Freedom of Information Act. It doesn't regard the president's own government, of which 47 inspectors general formally complained to the congressional oversight committees that some of their colleagues were being stymied by federal agencies. Such restrictions "represent potentially serious challenges to ... our ability to conduct our work thoroughly, independently, and in a timely manner," they wrote.

The administration's secrecy has earned critical and unprecedented reviews from many working in and with the media, including the New York Times's James Risen ("the greatest enemy of press freedom that we have encountered in at least a generation") and former executive editor Jill Abramson ("the most secretive White House I have ever been involved in covering"), Pentagon Papers lawyer James C. Goodale ("... Obama will surely pass President Richard Nixon as the worst president ever on issues of national security and press freedom"), and the non-profit Committee to Protect Journalists, which published a harsh report of the Obama White House in 2013.

"Even as the appetite for information and data flowing through the Internet is voracious, we've seen newsrooms closed. The bottom line has shrunk. The news cycle has, as well," the president said Monday. "And too often, there is enormous pressure on journalists to fill the void and feed the beast with instant commentary and Twitter rumors, and celebrity gossip, and softer stories."

Perhaps if his administration were more open, members of the press would have other things to write about.

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