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Nature of Suit Code: 890
Nature of Suit: Other Statutory Actions
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued En Banc January 27, 2005 Decided May 10, 2005

No. 02-5354

IN RE:RICHARD B. CHENEY, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE

UNITED STATES, ET AL.,

PETITIONERS

Consolidated with Nos.

02-5355 & 02-5356

On Petition for Writ of Mandamus and 

Appeals from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(01cv01530)

(02cv00631)

Paul D. Clement, Acting Solicitor General, U.S.

Department of Justice, argued the cause for petitioners. With

him on the briefs were Peter D. Keisler, Assistant Attorney

General, Kenneth L. Wainstein, United States Attorney, Edwin

S. Kneedler, Deputy Solicitor General, Gregory G. Katsas,

Deputy Assistant Attorney General, David B. Salmons and

Douglas Hallward-Driemeier, Assistants to the Solicitor

General, and Mark B. Stern, Thomas M. Bondy, and Michael S.

Raab, Attorneys. Eric D. Miller, Attorney, and Shannon W.

Coffin entered appearances.

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Sanjay Narayan and Paul J. Orfanedes argued the cause for

respondents Sierra Club and Judicial Watch, Inc. With them on

the brief were Alex Levinson, David Bookbinder, Roger

Adelman, and James F. Peterson. 

David Overlook Stewart, Thomas M. Susman, and Stacy J.

Dawson were on the brief of amici curiae American Association

for Law Libraries, et al. in support of respondents.

Before: GINSBURG, Chief Judge, and EDWARDS, SENTELLE,

RANDOLPH, ROGERS, TATEL, GARLAND, and ROBERTS, Circuit

Judges.

Opinion for the Court En Banc filed by Circuit Judge

RANDOLPH.

RANDOLPH, Circuit Judge: The Supreme Court vacated our

decision in In re Cheney, 334 F.3d 1096 (D.C. Cir. 2003), and

remanded the case for reconsideration of the government’s

petition for a writ of mandamus. Cheney v. U.S. Dist. Court,

124 S. Ct. 2576 (2004). We granted the government’s motion

to rehear the case en banc. The Supreme Court’s opinion, and

our opinion, lay out the history of these proceedings in

considerable detail. We will assume familiarity with both

opinions and state only the essentials. The ultimate issue is

whether this court should issue a writ of mandamus ordering the

district court to dismiss the case.

I.

On January 29, 2001, President George W. Bush issued a

memorandum establishing the National Energy Policy

Development Group (NEPDG) within the Executive Office of

the President for the purpose of developing a “national energy

policy designed to help the private sector, and government at all

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levels, promote dependable, affordable, and environmentally

sound production and distribution of energy for the future.” The

President named Vice President Cheney chairman and assigned

cabinet secretaries and other federal officials to serve with the

Vice President. Five months later, the NEPDG issued its final

report to the President. As the President directed, the NEPDG

ceased to exist as of “the end of fiscal year 2001,” that is,

September 30, 2001.

Judicial Watch and the Sierra Club filed actions, later

consolidated, seeking NEPDG documents on the ground that the

group was an “advisory committee” within the meaning of the

Federal Advisory Committee Act, or FACA, 5 U.S.C. App. § 3.

“‘[A]dvisory committee’ means any committee, board,

commission, council, conference, panel, task force, or other

similar group, or any subcommittee or other subgroup thereof”

“established or utilized by the President” or an agency for the

purpose “of obtaining advice.” Id. § 3(2). Exempted from

FACA are groups “composed wholly of full-time, or permanent

part-time, officers or employees of the Federal Government.”

Id. Subject to the Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. § 552,

each FACA advisory committee must make publicly available

its “records, reports, transcripts, minutes, appendixes, working

papers, drafts, studies, agenda, or other documents which were

made available to or prepared for or by” the committee. 5

U.S.C. App. § 10(b).

The only individuals the President named to the NEPDG

were federal officials; only federal officials signed the final

report. To avoid the exemption in § 3(2) of FACA, Judicial

Watch alleged, on information and belief, that non-federal

employees “fully participated in non-public meetings of the

NEPDG as if they were members of the NEPDG, and, in fact,

were members of the NEPDG.” Judicial Watch Compl. ¶ 25.

Sierra Club’s allegations were somewhat different. It claimed

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that the NEPDG and “Task Force Sub-Groups were not

composed wholly of full time officers or employees of the

federal government,” apparently because “[e]nergy industry

executives, including multiple representatives of single energy

companies, and other non-federal employees, attended meetings

and participated in activities of [the NEPDG] and Task Force

Sub-Groups.” Sierra Club Compl. ¶ 19. These “Task Force

Sub-Groups,” the Sierra Club alleged, became FACA advisory

committees when federal officials “participated in and exercised

responsibility over meetings and other activities involving

groups of energy industry executives and other non-federal

employees, for the purpose of obtaining advice and

recommendations on the Administration’s national energy

policy.” Id. ¶ 18. As the Supreme Court noted, both Judicial

Watch and the Sierra Club relied on Association of American

Physicians & Surgeons, Inc. v. Clinton, 997 F.2d 898 (D.C. Cir.

1993) (“AAPS”), to “contend that the regular participation of the

non-Government individuals made them de facto members of

the committee.” Cheney v. U.S. Dist. Court, 124 S. Ct. at 2583.

The complaints invoked the Administrative Procedure Act,

5 U.S.C. § 706, and the Mandamus Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1361, and

named as defendants the Vice President, the NEPDG, and the

federal officials who served on the NEPDG. The Judicial Watch

complaint also listed as defendants alleged de facto non-federal

members of the Group. Plaintiffs sought a declaratory judgment

and an injunction requiring the production of all materials

subject to disclosure under FACA.

The government moved to dismiss, arguing, among other

things, that FACA did not create a cause of action and that

application of FACA to the NEPDG would infringe upon the

President’s constitutional authority to recommend legislation to

Congress and to require opinions from department heads. The

district court agreed that FACA did not create a private cause of

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The court granted the government’s motion to dismiss the APA

claims against the Vice President but refused to rule on the APA

claims against those federal defendants who headed agencies. 219 F.

Supp. 2d at 39-40. In the meantime, as Judicial Watch and the Sierra

Club now concede, the agency heads complied with the discovery

orders the government challenges in its mandamus petition in this

court. Brief for Sierra Club and Judicial Watch at 4. The APA is

therefore no longer part of this case. 

action and dismissed Judicial Watch’s claims against the nonfederal defendants. Judicial Watch v. Nat'l Energy Policy Dev.

Group, 219 F. Supp. 2d 20, 34 (D.D.C. 2002). The court also

dismissed the claims against the NEPDG because it no longer

existed. Id. at 35. But the court refused to dismiss the

mandamus actions against the Vice President. Id. at 44.1 While

acknowledging the force of the government’s separation-ofpowers argument, the court thought it should withhold decision

on the constitutional question until further factual development.

Id. at 54. The court then approved the plaintiffs’ discovery plan.

The government moved for a protective order, arguing that

discovery against the Vice President would itself violate the

separation of powers. With its motion, the government

submitted an affidavit from the Deputy Assistant to the Vice

President for Domestic Policy. On behalf of the Vice President,

the government also moved for leave to file a motion for

summary judgment. The court denied the government’s motion

for a protective order and refused to certify an appeal pursuant

to 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b).

On the government’s petition for a writ of mandamus

against the district court, under the All Writs Act, 28 U.S.C.

§ 1651, a divided panel of this court held that although

plaintiffs’ discovery request was overly broad, the government

had an alternative method of protecting itself because it could

invoke executive privilege to prevent discovery. In re Cheney,

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334 F.3d at 1105-06. The court therefore dismissed the

government’s petition. Id. at 1109. In so ruling, the court stated

that if “limited discovery” revealed “some degree of

participation by non-federal personnel, then the district court

will have to decide whether that participation amounts to de

facto membership” under AAPS. Id. at 1108.

The Supreme Court agreed that the discovery plan,

approved by the district court, was “overly broad,” 124 S. Ct. at

2590, and “unbounded in scope,” id. at 2591, seeking

“everything under the sky,” id. at 2590. But the Court ruled that

this court had “prematurely terminated its inquiry” into whether

a writ of mandamus should issue, and had done so “without even

reaching the weighty separation-of-powers objections raised in

the case,” and without exercising “discretion” to decide if the

writ is appropriate. Id. at 2593. The Court therefore vacated the

judgment and remanded the case, stating that this court “should

be sensitive to requests by the Government for interlocutory

appeals to reexamine, for example, whether the statute embodies

the de facto membership doctrine” of AAPS. Id.

II.

In considering FACA’s application to a committee within

the Executive Office of the President, we must keep in mind that

the statute does considerably more than require each “advisory

committee” to disclose publicly documents that would otherwise

remain confidential. Advisory committees must also file a

charter; announce their upcoming meetings in the Federal

Register; hold their meetings in public; and keep detailed

minutes of each meeting. 5 U.S.C. App. § 9(c); §§ 10(a)(1), (2),

(b) & (c); § 11. In addition, each such committee must “be

fairly balanced in terms of the points of view represented” and

may “not be inappropriately influenced by the appointing

authority or by any special interest.” Id. §§ 5(b)(2), (3) & (c).

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Although we do not reach the question whether applying FACA

to Presidential committees such as the NEPDG would be

constitutional, separation-of-powers considerations have an

important bearing on the proper interpretation of the statute, see

Public Citizen v. U.S. Dep’t of Justice, 491 U.S. 440, 466

(1989), and on the district court’s mandamus jurisdiction.

“[S]pecial considerations control when the Executive Branch’s

interest in maintaining the autonomy of its office and

safeguarding the confidentiality of its communications are

implicated.” Cheney v. U.S. Dist. Court, 124 S. Ct. at 2589. 

As to FACA, the critical question is whether plaintiffs have

carried their burden of showing that the NEPDG or its so-called

“Sub-Groups” were “advisory committees,” that is, committees

who were advising the President but were not “composed wholly

of full-time, or permanent part-time, officers or employees of

the Federal Government,” 5 U.S.C. App. § 3(2). While it is

often easy to determine who is and who is not a federal

employee, the question this lawsuit raises is different.

Application of FACA depends on who is a member of a

committee and who is not. On that subject, FACA is silent.

In light of the severe separation-of-powers problems in

applying FACA on the basis that private parties participated in,

or influenced, or were otherwise involved with a committee in

the Executive Office of the President, we must construe the

statute strictly. We therefore hold that such a committee is

composed wholly of federal officials if the President has given

no one other than a federal official a vote in or, if the committee

acts by consensus, a veto over the committee’s decisions.

Congress could not have meant that participation in

committee meetings or activities, even influential participation,

would be enough to make someone a member of the committee.

When congressional committees hold hearings, it is

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commonplace for the Senate or House members of the

committee to bring aides with them. The same is true when

high-ranking Executive Branch officials serving on committees

attend committee meetings. They, too, commonly bring aides

with them. An aide might exert great influence, but no one

would say that the aide was, therefore, a member of the

committee. The situation is comparable if an individual, not

employed by the federal government, attends meetings or

participates in the activities of a Presidential committee whose

official membership consists only of federal officials. The

outsider might make an important presentation, he might be

persuasive, the information he provides might affect the

committee’s judgment. But having neither a vote nor a veto

over the advice the committee renders to the President, he is no

more a member of the committee than the aides who accompany

Congressmen or cabinet officers to committee meetings.

Separation-of-powers concerns strongly support this

interpretation of FACA. In making decisions on personnel and

policy, and in formulating legislative proposals, the President

must be free to seek confidential information from many

sources, both inside the government and outside. See U.S.

CONST. art. II, § 1, cl.1; § 2, cls. 1 & 2; § 3; see Public Citizen,

491 U.S. at 466-67 (Kennedy, J., concurring in the judgment,

joined by Rehnquist, C.J., and O’Connor, J.); id. at 488. If the

President considers appointing a committee to advise him on a

policy matter, as he did in this case, he has two options. He may

choose to form a FACA committee by appointing some of its

members from outside the federal government. Or he may

choose to form a committee composed only of federal

employees and thus exempt from FACA. By following the

latter course, the President can easily create an advisory body

whose internal communications will remain confidential, so long

as the right to vote or veto is not later extended to a non-federal

employee. 

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III.

With this interpretation of FACA in mind we turn to

plaintiffs’ actions for mandamus-type relief. We put the matter

in these terms because it is not technically accurate to speak of

their actions as petitions for a writ of mandamus. Rule 81(b) of

the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure long ago abolished the writ

of mandamus in the district courts (although not in the appellate

courts). But the Rule permitted “[r]elief heretofore available by

mandamus” to be obtained by actions brought in compliance

with the rules. FED. R. CIV. P. 81(b). “The principles that

governed the former writ now govern attempts to secure similar

relief,” such as a mandatory injunction ordering a government

employee or agency to perform a duty owed to the plaintiff.

Sanchez-Espinoza v. Reagan, 770 F.2d 202, 207 n.7 (D.C. Cir.

1985) (Scalia, J.); see HART & WECHSLER’S THE FEDERAL

COURTS AND THE FEDERAL SYSTEM 941-42 (5th ed. 2003).

Thus, the Mandamus Act, on which plaintiffs relied, confers

jurisdiction on the district courts over actions “in the nature of

mandamus to compel an officer or employee of the United

States or any agency thereof to perform a duty owed to the

plaintiff.” 28 U.S.C. § 1361.

Jurisdiction over actions “in the nature of mandamus” under

§ 1361, like jurisdiction over the now-abolished petitions for

writs of mandamus, is strictly confined. As the original panel in

this case rightly pointed out, mandamus is “drastic”; it is

available only in “extraordinary situations”; it is hardly ever

granted; those invoking the court’s mandamus jurisdiction must

have a “clear and indisputable” right to relief; and even if the

plaintiff overcomes all these hurdles, whether mandamus relief

should issue is discretionary. See 334 F.3d at 1101-02.

Although the panel was speaking of this court’s mandamus

jurisdiction under the All Writs Act, the Supreme Court held

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that the district court’s “analysis of whether mandamus relief is

appropriate should itself be constrained” by the same principles.

Cheney v. U.S. Dist. Court, 124 S. Ct. at 2593; see Heckler v.

Ringer, 466 U.S. 602, 616 (1984). 

We held in13th Regional Corp. v. Dep’t of the Interior, 654

F.2d 758 (D.C. Cir. 1980), that the word “duty” in § 1361 must

be narrowly defined, and that a plaintiff’s legal grounds

supporting the government’s duty to him must “be clear and

compelling.” Id. at 760. This does not mean that mandamus

actions are ruled out whenever the statute allegedly creating the

duty is ambiguous. Id. The district court still must interpret the

underlying statute, as must we. But if there is no clear and

compelling duty under the statute as interpreted, the district

court must dismiss the action. To this extent, mandamus

jurisdiction under § 1361 merges with the merits.

Neither Judicial Watch nor the Sierra Club explicitly

claimed that any non-federal individual had a vote on the

NEPDG or had a veto over its decisions. Sierra Club Compl.

¶ 18. Judicial Watch did state, on information and belief, that

individuals not employed by the federal government “fully

participated in non-public meetings of the NEPDG as if they

were members of the NEPDG, and, in fact, were members of the

NEPDG.” Judicial Watch Compl. ¶ 25. It is perhaps possible

to view this portion of the complaint as alleging that non-federal

employees had the right to vote on, or to veto, NEPDG decisions

during its meetings. But such allegations are belied by the

statement of Andrew Lundquist, Executive Director of the

NEPDG, which Judicial Watch attached to its complaint. In

determining whether to dismiss, courts treat documents attached

to a complaint as if they are part of the complaint. See EEOC v.

St. Francis Xavier Parochial Sch., 117 F.3d 621, 624-25 (D.C.

Cir. 1997). Lundquist’s statement, dated May 4, 2001, answered

inquiries from the ranking minority members of two committees

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2 A Report of the Government Accounting Office in 2003, on which

plaintiffs rely, also reported the statements of the federal officials who

attended NEPDG meetings that attendance was limited to federal

officers and employees. GAO, Energy Task Force: Process Used to

of the House of Representatives. In response to a question

asking for a list of the members of the NEPDG, Lundquist

named the Vice President, seven cabinet members, and several

other federal officers. He stated that no non-federal employees

served as members or staff of the NEPDG. He also stated that

the NEPDG’s meetings were held in January, February, March,

April, and May, and that the meetings consisted only of federal

officers. And there is nothing to indicate that non-federal

employees had a right to vote on committee matters or exercise

a veto over committee proposals. Therefore, the NEPDG was

not a FACA advisory committee. It follows that the government

owed the plaintiffs no duty, let alone a clear and indisputable or

compelling one.

That neither Sierra Club nor Judicial Watch had a clear

right to have the government perform a duty owed to them

became even more apparent in view of the sworn declaration of

Karen Knutson, filed by the government with the district court

in September 2002. See FED. R. CIV. P. 12(h)(3) (“Whenever it

appears by suggestion of the parties or otherwise that the court

lacks jurisdiction of the subject matter, the court shall dismiss

the action.”). At the time of her declaration, and during the

existence of the NEPDG, Knutson served as the Deputy

Assistant to the Vice President for Domestic Policy. The

Knutson declaration, based on personal knowledge, further

confirmed that attendance at NEPDG meetings was “strictly

limited” to federal officers and one federal employee of the

officer’s department. At another point, the declaration

emphasized that no outsiders participated in any NEPDG

meetings.2

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Develop the National Energy Policy 9 (Aug. 2003). The GAO

examined the method by which the NEPDG developed its final report

and sought to determine the costs associated with formulating the

report. Id. at 1.

Plaintiffs also contended that so-called “Task Force SubGroups” were FACA advisory committees. Judicial Watch

Compl. ¶ 53; Sierra Club Compl. ¶¶ 18-19. FACA defines

“advisory committee” to include not only committees and other

such groups, but also “any subcommittee or other subgroup

thereof.” 5 U.S.C. App. § 3(2). President Bush, in his directive

establishing the NEPDG, gave the Vice President the authority

to set up “subordinate working groups,” but the Vice President

never exercised this authority. See Decl. of Karen Knutson ¶ 11,

Sept. 3, 2002. Judicial Watch admits as much. Its complaint

stated that the subgroups it had in mind were established

“without specific authorization” of the President. Judicial

Watch Compl. ¶ 54f. While the complaints alleged that persons

other than federal officials participated in the work of

subgroups, e.g., Sierra Club Compl. ¶¶ 18-19, other allegations

indicate that plaintiffs were referring to the NEPDG’s staff’s

“so-called ‘stakeholder meetings’” with non-governmental

parties, Judicial Watch Compl. ¶ 30. There is no allegation,

however, that any supposed subgroup made an official decision,

much less that anyone other than a federal official had a vote in

or veto over such a decision. Indeed, the Lundquist statement

attached to Judicial Watch’s complaint made this clear by noting

that federal employees on the NEPDG support staff “have met

with many individuals who are not Federal employees to gather

information relevant to the Group’s work, but such meetings do

not involve deliberations or any effort to achieve consensus on

advice or recommendations. These meetings by the Group’s

staff were simply forums to collect individual views rather than

to bring a collective judgment to bear.” Responses of Andrew

Lundquist at 2, May 4, 2001. If the NEPDG staff’s “stakeholder

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meetings” involved no “effort to achieve consensus” or

“collective judgment,” then clearly no non-government

participants in those meetings exercised any vote or veto.

Reinforcing this conclusion, the Knutson affidavit reported that

no one other than federal officials “attended or participated in

any meetings of the NEPDG or the Staff Working Group.” The

“Task Force Sub-Groups” were therefore not FACA

committees. 

* * *

For all of these reasons we hold that plaintiffs have failed

to establish any duty, let alone a clear and indisputable duty,

owed to them by the federal government under FACA. We shall

therefore issue a writ of mandamus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1651

directing the district court to dismiss the complaints.

So ordered.

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