In The Associated Press’s extensive investigation of the Obama Administration’s increasingly secretive practices regarding Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests is this amazing anecdote on a FOIA request seeking emails between reporters and top Clinton press aide Philippe Reines:
Sometimes, the government said it searched and couldn’t find what citizens wanted. …
Likewise, [John] Cook, departing as the editor at Gawker, was exasperated when the State Department told him it couldn’t find any emails between journalists and Philippe Reines, Hillary Clinton’s personal spokesman when Clinton was secretary of state. …
“They said there were no records,” Cook said of the State Department.
This despite the fact that you can literally google emails of Reines caustically telling a reporter to “fuck off” for
asking tough questions about the attack on the U.S. diplomatic facility in Benghazi.
We’ve got one question for journalists: do you have any emails with Reines Clinton’s Department claimed never existed?
UPDATE 3/19: Per Buzzfeed the State Department took a full year to respond to the request for the emails before saying their were none. Now they are going to take another look. Buzzfeed quotes the Sunlight Foundation, “I can’t think of any legitimate reason they would withhold this.” Ridiculous.