The Patriot Post® · NSA Tests Sunshine Laws

The National Security Agency thought one of its lawyers accidentally disclosed some classified information during a testimony in the court case Jewel v. NSA, a case about the NSA’s alleged illegal surveillance. So it tried to do what any super-secretive intelligence agency would do – cover it up by quietly asking to delete portions the official court transcript. But the judge hearing the case dismissed the request. The Electric Frontier Foundation, which brought the suit against the NSA, said what the NSA wanted to do violates the First Amendment’s guarantee to open records and meetings. “The government’s attempt to change this history was unprecedented,” wrote David Greene, senior staff attorney for EFF. “We could find no example of where a court had granted such a remedy or even where such a request had been made. This was another example of the government’s attempt to shroud in secrecy both its own actions, as well as the challenges to those actions.” Again, actions prove the character of the organization. More…