Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-12-05363/USCOURTS-caDC-12-05363-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 895
Nature of Suit: Freedom of Information Act of 1974
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued November 26, 2013 Decided January 3, 2014

No. 12-5363

ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION,

APPELLANT

v.

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE,

APPELLEE

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:11-cv-00939)

Mark Rumold argued the cause for appellant. With him on 

the briefs was David L. Sobel. 

Melanie Sloan and Anne L. Weismann were on the brief for 

amici curiae Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in 

Washington, et al. in support of appellant. 

Daniel Tenny, Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, 

argued the cause for appellee. With him on the brief were 

Stuart F. Delery, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Ronald 

C. Machen Jr., U.S. Attorney, and Michael S. Raab, Attorney, 

U.S. Department of Justice.

USCA Case #12-5363 Document #1473387 Filed: 01/03/2014 Page 1 of 20
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Before: SRINIVASAN, Circuit Judge, and EDWARDS and 

SENTELLE, Senior Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Senior Circuit Judge

EDWARDS.

EDWARDS, Senior Circuit Judge: Electronic Frontier 

Foundation (“EFF”) appeals the District Court’s denial of its 

request under the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”), 

5 U.S.C. § 552 et seq., for disclosure of a legal opinion (the 

“OLC Opinion”) prepared for the Federal Bureau of 

Investigation (the “FBI”) by the Office of Legal Counsel

(“OLC”) in the Department of Justice. Elec. Frontier Found. v. 

Dep’t of Justice, 892 F. Supp. 2d 95 (D.D.C. 2012). The 

District Court held that the OLC Opinion, in its entirety, is 

exempt from FOIA disclosure for two reasons. First, the 

District Court held that the OLC Opinion is covered by the

“deliberative process privilege” in FOIA Exemption 5, which 

“covers ‘documents reflecting advisory opinions, 

recommendations and deliberations comprising part of a 

process by which governmental decisions and policies are 

formulated.’” Dep’t of Interior v. Klamath Water Users 

Protective Ass’n, 532 U.S. 1, 8 (2001) (quoting NLRB v. Sears, 

Roebuck & Co., 421 U.S. 132, 150 (1975)); 5 U.S.C. 

§ 552(b)(5). Second, the District Court concluded that portions 

of the OLC Opinion are exempt from disclosure under FOIA 

Exemption 1 because they are “specifically authorized under 

criteria established by an Executive order to be kept secret in 

the interest of national defense or foreign policy” and “are in 

fact properly classified pursuant to such Executive order.”

Elec. Frontier Found., 982 F. Supp. 2d at 91-101 (citing 5 

U.S.C. § 552(b)(1)).

EFF contests the District Court’s holding that the OLC 

Opinion is covered by the deliberative process privilege. Br. of 

Appellant at 19-34. EFF argues further that, even if the OLC 

Opinion might have been covered by the deliberative process 

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privilege, the FBI waived the privilege by relying on the OLC 

Opinion in dealings with Congress and the Office of the 

Inspector General (the “OIG”). Id. at 34-37. Finally, EFF 

claims that the District Court erred in failing to require the 

agency “to specify in detail which portions of the document are 

disclosable and which are allegedly exempt” under 

Exemption 1. Id. at 46 (quoting Kimberlin v. Dep’t of Justice, 

139 F.3d 944, 950 (D.C. Cir. 1998)), and that it also “erred by 

failing to determine whether there was unclassified, factual 

information . . . that was ‘reasonably segregable’ from the 

[OLC] Opinion’s other content.” Id. at 50 (quoting 5 U.S.C. 

§ 552(b)).

On the record before us, we hold that the OLC Opinion, 

which was requested by the FBI in response to the OIG’s

investigation into its information-gathering techniques, is an

“advisory opinion[], recommendation[] and deliberation[] 

comprising part of a process by which governmental decisions 

and policies are formulated,” and is therefore covered by the 

deliberative process privilege. Klamath Water Users, 532 U.S. 

at 8 (quotation omitted). We also hold that the FBI did not 

“adopt” the OLC Opinion and thereby waive the deliberative 

process privilege. The OIG mentioned the OLC Opinion in its 

report, and a congressional committee inquired about the OLC 

Opinion, but the FBI never itself adopted the OLC Opinion’s 

reasoning as its own. Finally, because the entire OLC Opinion 

is exempt from disclosure under the deliberative process 

privilege, we need not decide whether particular sections were

properly withheld as classified, or whether some material is

reasonably segregable from the material properly withheld. 

I. BACKGROUND

A. Statutory Framework

FOIA requires government agencies to make available 

“final opinions . . . as well as orders,” “statements of policy and 

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interpretations which have been adopted by the agency,” and 

“administrative staff manuals and instructions . . . that affect a 

member of the public.” 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(2). FOIA 

exemptions allow agencies to withhold information from 

disclosure if it has been properly classified under criteria 

established by Executive order “to be kept secret in the interest 

of national defense or foreign policy,” id. § 552(b)(1) 

(Exemption 1), and “inter-agency or intra-agency 

memorandums or letters which would not be available by law 

to a party other than an agency in litigation with the agency,” 

id. § 552(b)(5) (Exemption 5). Exemption 5 covers material

that would be protected from disclosure in litigation under one 

of the recognized evidentiary or discovery privileges, such as 

the attorney-client privilege. Pub. Citizen, Inc. v. Office of 

Mgmt. & Budget, 598 F.3d 865, 874 (D.C. Cir. 2010) (citing 

Coastal States Gas Corp. v. Dep’t of Energy, 617 F.2d 854, 

862 (D.C. Cir. 1980)). The deliberative process privilege is one 

of the litigation privileges incorporated into Exemption 5. It 

allows an agency to withhold “all papers which reflect the 

agency’s group thinking in the process of working out its 

policy and determining what its law shall be.” Sears, 421 U.S. 

at 153 (quotations omitted).

B. Procedural History

Several statutes permit the FBI to use “national security 

letters” to subpoena telephone and financial records that it

certifies are connected to an authorized national security 

investigation. See Br. for Appellee at 4 (citing 12 U.S.C. 

§ 3414(a)(5)(A); 18 U.S.C. § 2709; 15 U.S.C. § 1681u(a)-(b); 

50 U.S.C. § 436(a)(1) (transferred to 50 U.S.C. § 3162)). The

USA Patriot Improvement and Reauthorization Act of 2005 

directed the OIG to audit the “effectiveness and use, including 

any improper or illegal use,” of these national security letters.

Pub. L. No. 109-177, § 119, 120 Stat. 192 (2006). The OIG’s 

initial report found that the FBI had issued “exigent letters” to 

request records from telephone companies in cases in which

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FBI officials had not certified that the records were part of an 

authorized national security investigation, as required for a 

bona fide national security letter. U.S. DEP’T OF JUSTICE,

OFFICE OF THE INSPECTOR GENERAL, A REVIEW OF THE 

FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION’S USE OF NATIONAL 

SECURITY LETTERS 92 (March 2007), 

http://www.justice.gov/oig/special/s0703b/final.pdf. 

Following these findings, the OIG conducted a second 

investigation into the FBI’s use of exigent letters for requesting 

telephone records. DEP’T OF JUSTICE, OFFICE OF THE 

INSPECTOR GENERAL, A REVIEW OF THE FEDERAL BUREAU OF 

INVESTIGATION’S USE OF EXIGENT LETTERS AND OTHER 

INFORMAL REQUESTS FOR TELEPHONE RECORDS (January 

2010) (“OIG

Report”), www.justice.gov/oig/special/s1001r.pdf, reprinted 

in part in Joint Appendix (“J.A.”) 46. The OIG provided the 

FBI with a draft of this report. Valerie Caproni, General 

Counsel of the FBI, then sought legal advice from OLC about

the investigative tactics at issue. Decl. of Paul P. Colborn,

Special Counsel in the Office of Legal Counsel at 4-5, 

reprinted in J.A. 21-22 (“Colborn Decl.”).

The OIG Report, which has been publicly disclosed,

explains that:

[A]fter reviewing a draft of the OIG report the FBI asked 

the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) for a legal opinion on 

this issue. . . . [T]he OLC agreed with the FBI that under 

certain circumstances [redacted authority] allows the FBI 

to ask for and obtain these records on a voluntary basis 

from the providers, without legal process or a qualifying 

emergency. . . . [T]he FBI acknowledged in its July 2009 

comments to a draft of this report that it had never 

considered or relied upon [redacted authority] when it 

obtained any of the telephone records at issue in this 

report. Moreover it cannot be known at this point whether 

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any provider would have divulged such records based on 

[redacted authority] alone, and without the FBI’s 

representation that a[] [national security letter] or other 

compulsory legal process would be served. 

OIG Report at 264-65, reprinted in J.A. 48-49. The OIG

Report concluded that “the potential use of [redacted authority] 

by the FBI has important policy implications” and “creates a 

significant gap in FBI accountability and oversight that should 

be examined closely by the FBI, the Department, and 

Congress.” Id. at 268, reprinted in J.A. 52. However, the OIG 

Report also acknowledged that “[t]he FBI has stated that it 

does not intend to rely on [redacted authority].” Id. at 265 

n.283, reprinted in J.A. 49. 

On April 14, 2010, the House Subcommittee on the 

Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties held a hearing 

concerning the OIG Report. As relevant to the OLC Opinion, 

FBI General Counsel Caproni testified: 

The OIG’s 2010 report discusses a January 8, 2010 

opinion issued by [OLC], which concluded that [the 

Electronic Communications Privacy Act] does not forbid 

electronic communications service providers, in certain 

circumstances, from disclosing certain call detail records 

to the FBI on a voluntary basis without legal process or a 

qualifying emergency. Many members of Congress have 

asked questions about this OLC opinion, which is 

classified. It is my understanding that it has been shared 

with our oversight committees, including this Committee, 

at the appropriate security level. Because of the classified 

nature of the OLC opinion, I cannot address it in this 

forum, but am available to discuss it in a secure setting. I 

can, however, state that the OLC opinion did not in any 

way factor into the FBI’s flawed practice of using exigent 

letters between 2003 and 2006 nor did it affect in any way 

the records-retention decisions made by the FBI as part of 

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the reconciliation project discussed above.

The Report of the Dep’t of Justice, OIG, Concerning the FBI’s 

use of Exigent Letters and Other Informal Requests for 

Telephone Records: Hearing Before the Subcomm. on the 

Constitution of the H. Comm. on the Judiciary, 111th Cong.

(April 14, 2010) at 10, reprinted in J.A. 60, 70 (Statement of 

Valerie E. Caproni, General Counsel, FBI) (“Caproni 

Testimony”). 

On February 15, 2011, EFF submitted a FOIA request for 

the OLC Opinion. Relying on FOIA Exemptions 1 and 5, the 

Department of Justice denied EFF’s request because the OLC 

Opinion contains classified information and is covered by the 

deliberative process privilege. Letter from Paul P. Colborn, 

Special Counsel in OLC, to David L. Sobel (Feb. 25, 2011), 

reprinted in J.A. 30. EFF filed suit in District Court seeking 

disclosure of the OLC Opinion. The Department of Justice

submitted two affidavits in support of its motion for summary 

judgment: Paul Colborn, Special Counsel in OLC, declared

that the OLC Opinion is “pre-decisional and deliberative” in 

nature, and “disclosure . . . would undermine the deliberative 

processes of the government and chill the candid and frank 

communications necessary for effective decision-making.”

Colborn Decl. at 6, reprinted in J.A. 23. Colborn further 

declared that the OLC Opinion is also exempt from disclosure 

insofar as it contains “content derived from confidential and 

classified communications made by the FBI to OLC.” Id. at 5, 

reprinted in J.A. 22. 

David Hardy, Section Chief of the Record/Information 

Dissemination Section, Records Management Division, of the 

FBI, declared that portions of the OLC Opinion were properly 

classified because “unauthorized disclosure of this information 

‘reasonably could be expected to cause serious damage to the 

national security.’” Corrected Decl. of David M. Hardy at 5, 

reprinted in J.A. 33-44, 37 (quoting Exec. Order No. 13,526, 

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Classified National Security Information, § 1.1(a), 75 Fed. 

Reg. 707 (Dec. 29, 2009)). Hardy explained that the 

information contained in the OLC Opinion is “highly specific 

in nature and known to very few individuals,” it describes 

intelligence gathering techniques that the FBI presently uses, 

and disclosure “would allow hostile entities to discover the 

current methods and activities used and . . . then develop 

countermeasures which could severely disrupt the FBI’s 

intelligence-gathering capabilities.” Id. at 9, reprinted in J.A.

41. 

The District Court concluded that the OLC Opinion is 

covered by the deliberative process privilege because it 

“contains inter-agency material that was generated as a 

continuous process of agency decision-making, namely how to 

respond to the OIG’s critique of the FBI’s 

information-gathering methods.” 892 F. Supp. 2d at 103. The 

District Court declined to rule on whether attorney-client 

privilege also exempts the OLC Opinion from disclosure

because the deliberative process privilege applies to all 

portions of the document that would be subject to the 

attorney-client privilege. Id. The District Court noted that the 

Department of Justice is “asserting Exemption 1 only as to 

certain paragraphs of the OLC Opinion which have been 

marked as classified in accordance with the classification 

markings included in the FBI’s two letters to OLC requesting 

legal advice,” and it found the Department of Justice’s 

declarations sufficiently specific “to identify the records 

referenced and understand the basic reasoning behind the 

claimed exemptions.” Id. at 101 (quoting Morley v. CIA, 508 

F.3d 1108, 1123 (D.C. Cir. 2007)). The District Court 

concluded that “no portion of the OLC Opinion is reasonably 

segregable and releasable” because “the entirety of the OLC 

Opinion was withheld under Exemption 5, leaving nothing 

significant that could be disclosed in redacted format.” Id. at 

104. 

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II. ANALYSIS

A. Standard of Review

We review decisions granting summary judgment in FOIA 

cases de novo. Sussman v. U.S. Marshals Serv., 494 F.3d 1106, 

1111-12 (D.C. Cir. 2007). The agency bears the burden of 

showing that a claimed exemption applies. Pub. Citizen, 598 

F.3d at 869 (citing Loving v. Dep’t of Def., 550 F.3d 32, 37 

(D.C. Cir. 2008)). Summary judgment is warranted when the 

agency’s affidavits “describe the justifications for 

nondisclosure with reasonably specific detail, demonstrate that 

the information withheld logically falls within the claimed 

exemption, and are not controverted by either contrary 

evidence in the record nor by evidence of agency bad faith.” 

Miller v. Casey, 730 F.2d 773, 776 (D.C. Cir. 1984) 

(quotations omitted); Larson v. Dep’t of State, 565 F.3d 857, 

862 (D.C. Cir. 2009) (“Ultimately, an agency’s justification for 

invoking a FOIA exemption is sufficient if it appears logical or 

plausible.” (quotations omitted)).

B. Deliberative Process Privilege

The deliberative process privilege protects agencies from 

being “forced to operate in a fishbowl.” EPA v. Mink, 410 U.S. 

73, 87 (1973) (quotations omitted). And it applies when 

“production of the contested document would be injurious to 

the consultative functions of government that the privilege of 

nondisclosure protects.” Id. (quotations omitted). The privilege

“calls for disclosure of all opinions and interpretations which 

embody the agency’s effective law and policy, and the 

withholding of all papers which reflect the agency’s group 

thinking in the process of working out its policy and 

determining what its law shall be.” Sears, 421 U.S. at 153 

(quotations omitted). The privilege is limited to documents 

that are “predecisional” and “deliberative,” meaning “they 

‘reflect[] advisory opinions, recommendations, and 

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deliberations comprising part of a process by which 

governmental decisions and policies are formulated, [or] the 

personal opinions of the writer prior to the agency’s adoption 

of a policy.’” Pub. Citizen, 598 F.3d at 875 (quoting Taxation 

With Representation Fund v. IRS, 646 F.2d 666, 677 (D.C. Cir. 

1981)). 

Importantly, the Supreme Court’s decision in Sears

explained that, under FOIA, agencies must disclose their 

“working law,” i.e. the “reasons which [supplied] the basis for 

an agency policy actually adopted.” 421 U.S. at 152-53. In 

other words, an agency is not permitted to develop “a body of 

‘secret law,’ used by it in the discharge of its regulatory duties 

and in its dealings with the public, but hidden behind a veil of 

privilege because it is not designated as ‘formal,’ ‘binding,’ or 

‘final.’” Schlefer v. United States, 702 F.2d 233, 244 (D.C. Cir. 

1983) (quoting Coastal States, 617 F.2d at 867). Therefore, an 

agency must disclose “binding agency opinions and 

interpretations” that the agency “actually applies in cases 

before it.” Id. (quoting Sterling Drug Inc. v. FTC, 450 F.2d 

698, 708 (D.C. Cir. 1971)).

In Sterling Drug, we required disclosure of memoranda 

prepared by the Federal Trade Commission to the extent that 

they contained “orders and interpretations” that the 

Commission actually applied in a particular acquisition case. 

450 F.2d at 708. We explained that the deliberative process 

privilege’s policy “of promoting the free flow of ideas within 

the agency does not apply here, for private transmittals of 

binding agency opinions and interpretations should not be 

encouraged.” Id. In Coastal States, we followed this principle 

to hold that memoranda from regional counsel to auditors in 

field offices must be disclosed because the memoranda

“represent[ed] interpretations of established policy on which 

the agency relies in discharging its regulatory responsibilities.” 

617 F.2d at 869. Such interpretations “are not the ideas and 

theories which go into the making of the law, they are the law

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itself, and as such should be made available to the public.” Id.

at 868 (quoting Sterling Drug, 450 F.2d at 708); accord

Schlefer, 702 F.2d at 244 (holding that the privilege does not 

extend to opinions of the Chief Counsel of the Maritime 

Administration interpreting statutes the agency administers 

because they “are authoritative Agency decisions in the cases 

to which they are addressed and . . . also guide subsequent 

Agency rulings”).

The same principle applied in Tax Analysts v. IRS, 117 

F.3d 607 (D.C. Cir. 1997) (Tax Analysts I), where we held that 

the privilege did not cover advice memoranda from the Office 

of the Chief Counsel to field personnel providing legal 

guidance with respect to the situations of specific tax payers. 

Id. at 609, 618. We explained that the “structure and purposes” 

of the system of issuing advisory memoranda to field 

personnel “reveal that the national office, in issuing these 

memoranda, is attempting to develop a body of coherent, 

consistent interpretations of federal tax laws nationwide.” Id.

at 617. Hence, even though the memoranda are “nominally 

non-binding,” they are “considered statements of the agency’s 

legal position.” Id. Reaching the same conclusion with respect 

to similar advice memoranda in Tax Analysts v. IRS, 294 F.3d 

71 (D.C. Cir. 2002) (Tax Analysts II), we noted that the 

memoranda used language such as “[i]t is the position of the 

Treasury Department that . . .” and “[w]e conclude.” Id. at 81. 

We explained that the “tone of these [memoranda] indicates 

that they ‘simply explain and apply established policy.’” Id.

(quoting Coastal States, 617 F.2d at 869).

In Public Citizen, we found that the deliberative process

privilege did not cover Office of Management and Budget 

(“OMB”) memoranda describing which agencies were 

permitted, by statute or by prior OMB practice, to submit their 

budgetary materials to Congress without first clearing them 

with OMB. 598 F.3d at 868. We found that these documents 

“determine OMB’s interaction with outsiders” and had 

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“real-world effects on the behavior of . . . agencies,” id. at 872;

the documents thus “reflect[ed] OMB’s formal or informal 

policy” and “fit comfortably within the working law 

framework,” id. at 875. 

None of the foregoing authorities is dispositive here, 

however, because OLC did not have the authority to establish

the “working law” of the FBI. OLC therefore did not “explain 

and apply established policy.” Tax Analysts II, 294 F.3d at 81 

(quoting Coastal States, 617 F.2d at 869). The OLC Opinion

instead amounts to advice offered by OLC for consideration by 

officials of the FBI. Such a memorandum is not the law of an 

agency unless the agency adopts it. See Part C. infra.

The authorities that control the disposition of this case are 

the decisions holding that the deliberative process privilege 

does cover legal memoranda that concern the advisability of a 

particular policy, but do not authoritatively state or determine

the agency’s policy. For example, we have held exempt from 

disclosure memoranda containing legal advice from the Legal 

Adviser to the Secretary of State “concerning United States 

policy on issues involving” affairs in the Middle East. Brinton 

v. Dep’t of State, 636 F.2d 600, 602 (D.C. Cir. 1980). The court 

explained that “[t]here can be no doubt that such legal advice, 

given in the form of intra-agency memoranda prior to any 

agency decision on the issues involved, fits exactly within the 

deliberative process rationale for Exemption 5.” Id. at 604. The 

Legal Adviser’s “role is to give advice to those in the State 

Department who do make the policy decisions,” and, thus, the 

“flow of advisory material is exactly opposite of the paradigm 

of ‘final opinions,’ which typically flow from a superior with 

policy-making authority to a subordinate who carries out the 

policy.” Id. at 605 (citation omitted). In Murphy v. Dep’t of 

Army, 613 F.2d 1151, 1154 (1979), this court held that the 

privilege covers a memorandum from the Army General 

Counsel to Assistant Secretary providing advice on whether to 

enter a contract, because “[t]he Assistant Secretary who had 

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decision-making power . . . sought advice from the general 

counsel . . . on the legal questions raised.” (citations omitted) 

(emphasis added).

EFF argues that the OLC Opinion constituted the “working 

law” of the FBI because it “constituted ‘guidance’ used by [the 

agency] in [its] dealings with the public.” Br. of Appellant at 

29 (quoting Coastal States, 617 F.2d at 869). The Government 

counters that the FBI’s “[c]onsultation with legal advisers at 

the Department of Justice constitutes precisely the sort of 

‘give-and-take of the consultative process’ that the deliberative 

process privilege was designed to protect.” Br. for Appellee at 

15 (quotations omitted). According to the Government, OLC’s 

Opinion is not the FBI’s “final decision about how, if at all, to 

alter its investigatory techniques,” because “th[is] decision was 

the FBI’s to make after consulting with OLC and any other 

parts of the government it chose to involve in its policy-making 

process.” Id. (quotations omitted).

Because OLC cannot speak authoritatively on the FBI’s 

policy, the OLC Opinion differs from memoranda we have 

found to constitute the “working law” of an agency. In each of 

these cases, to avoid the development of “secret law,” the 

agency was required to disclose a document that represented a 

conclusive or authoritative statement of its policy, usually a 

higher authority instructing a subordinate on how the agency’s 

general policy applies to a particular case, or a document that 

determined policy or applied established policy. In contrast, 

the OLC Opinion is more similar to the advice from the Legal 

Adviser to the Secretary of State pertaining to policy in the 

Middle East in Brinton, or the advice from the Army’s General 

Counsel pertaining to the advisability of a certain contract in 

Murphy. OLC is not authorized to make decisions about the 

FBI’s investigative policy, so the OLC Opinion cannot be an 

authoritative statement of the agency’s policy. See Colborn

Decl. at 1-2, reprinted in J.A. 18-19 (“OLC does not purport, 

and in fact lacks authority, to make policy decisions. OLC’s 

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legal advice and analysis may inform the decisionmaking of 

Executive Branch officials on matters of policy, but OLC’s 

legal advice is not itself dispositive as to any policy adopted.”).

EFF argues that the OLC Opinion must be “working law” 

because it is controlling (insofar as agencies customarily 

follow OLC advice that they request), precedential, and can be 

withdrawn. Br. of Appellant at 22-24, 30-34. That the OLC 

Opinion bears these indicia of a binding legal decision does not 

overcome the fact that OLC does not speak with authority on 

the FBI’s policy; therefore, the OLC Opinion could not be the 

“working law” of the FBI unless the FBI “adopted” what OLC 

offered. In Brinton, we rejected the appellant’s claim that 

memoranda must be released because they constituted the 

“final opinions” of the Department of State. We explained that 

while the privilege does not protect final decisions or 

authoritative statements on agency policy, the “final opinions”

of the Department of State’s Legal Adviser, “who has no 

authority to make final decisions concerning United States 

policy in the Middle East,” are not final decisions of the 

Department of State. 636 F.2d at 605. The same is true of the 

OLC Opinion in this case.

Even if the OLC Opinion describes the legal parameters of 

what the FBI is permitted to do, it does not state or determine 

the FBI’s policy. The FBI was free to decline to adopt the 

investigative tactics deemed legally permissible in the OLC 

Opinion. Indeed, the OIG’s report acknowledged that the FBI 

had “declined, for the time being, to rely on the authority 

discussed in the OLC Opinion.” Br. for Appellee at 15-16 

(citing OIG Report at 265 n.283, reprinted in J.A. 49). The 

OLC Opinion does not provide an authoritative statement of 

the FBI’s policy. It merely examines policy options available 

to the FBI. Therefore, the OLC Opinion is not the “working 

law” of the FBI. 

On this record, we hold that the OLC Opinion reflects 

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precisely the sort of “advisory opinion . . . comprising part of a 

process by which governmental decisions and policies are 

formulated” that is covered by the deliberative process 

privilege. Pub. Citizen, 598 F.3d at 875 (quotations omitted); 

accord Brennan Ctr. for Justice at New York Univ. Sch. of Law 

v. U.S. Dep’t of Justice, 697 F.3d 184, 203 (2d Cir. 2012) 

(“The [OLC] Memorandum does not constitute working law, 

or the agency’s effective law and policy.” (quotations 

omitted)); Nat’l Council of La Raza v. Dep’t of Justice, 411 

F.3d 350, 356 n.4 (2d Cir. 2005) (presuming OLC 

memorandum satisfies requirements of deliberative process 

privilege). 

C. Waiver by Public Adoption or Reliance

In Sears, the Court explained that Exemption 5 does not

apply “if an agency chooses expressly to adopt or incorporate 

by reference” a memorandum that would have otherwise been 

protected by the privilege. 421 U.S. at 161 (“[W]hen adopted, 

the reasoning becomes that of the agency and becomes its

responsibility to defend.”). The same day Sears was decided, 

the Court also held in Renegotiation Bd. v. Grumman Aircraft 

Eng’g Corp., that the “adoption” exception to Exemption 5 did 

not apply to reports addressing whether government 

contractors were required to refund excessive profits under 

their contracts, even though the agency’s decision agreed with 

the reports’ conclusion. The decision clarified that in order for 

the exception to apply, it must be evident that “the reasoning in 

the report is adopted by the [agency] as its reasoning, even 

when [the agency’s decision] agrees with the conclusion of a 

report.” 421 U.S. 168, 184 (1975). 

We have thus recognized that “the Court has refused to 

equate reference to a report’s conclusions with adoption of its 

reasoning, and it is the latter that destroys the privilege.” 

Access Reports v. Dep’t of Justice, 926 F.2d 1192, 1197 (D.C. 

Cir. 1991) (a department head’s “confused statement” in 

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testimony before a Senate committee that might be read as a 

reference to the privileged document “fell far short of the 

express adoption required by Sears”); Common Cause v. IRS,

646 F.2d 656, 660 (D.C. Cir. 1981) (“[C]asual allusion in a 

post-decisional document to subject matter discussed in some 

pre-decisional, intra-agency memoranda is not the express 

adoption or incorporation by reference which . . . would 

remove the protection of Exemption 5.”). These decisions 

stand in contrast to Afshar v. Dep’t of State, 702 F.2d 1125, 

1140 (D.C. Cir. 1983), where the court held that when 

“predecisional recommendations . . . are expressly adopted in 

[a] final, nonexempt memorandum, . . . ‘the reasoning becomes 

that of the agency and becomes its responsibility to defend.’” 

Id. at 1142 (quoting Sears, 421 U.S. at 161) (emphasis in 

Sears). In this case, EFF cannot point to any evidence 

supporting its claim that the FBI expressly adopted the OLC 

Opinion as its reasoning.

EFF argues that the FBI “adopted” the OLC Opinion by 

“approving[] public references in non-privileged agency 

documents (like the OIG report) and reliance in congressional 

testimony.” Br. of Appellant at 36. EFF relies on two decisions 

in which the Second Circuit held that an agency waived the 

privilege by referencing an OLC memorandum in its dealings 

with the public. Id. (citing Brennan Ctr., 697 F.3d at 204; La 

Raza, 411 F.3d at 357). But these cases are inapposite because,

in each one, the agency itself publicly invoked the reasoning of 

the OLC memorandum to justify its new position. 

In La Raza, the court found that the “Attorney General and 

his high-level staff made a practice of using the OLC 

Memorandum to justify and explain the Department [of 

Justice]’s policy and to assure the public and the very state and 

local government officials who would be asked to implement 

the new policy that the policy was legally sound.” 411 F.3d at 

358. In Brennan Center, a U.S. Agency for International 

Development guidance document referenced an OLC Opinion 

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as a basis for exempting U.S. non-governmental organizations

from a requirement to pledge to oppose sex trafficking in order 

to receive aid. 697 F.3d at 191. And when the agency changed 

this policy, a director explained during Congressional hearings 

that OLC had changed its position, and he was “simply 

following . . . the advice” of OLC. Id. at 192 (quotations 

omitted). 

This case differs from the cases cited by EFF because the 

public references to the OLC Opinion did not come from the 

FBI itself. Rather, the public references originated from the 

OIG and Congress. The OIG mentioned the OLC Opinion in 

its Report and Caproni was asked about it by members of 

Congress. However, the FBI never itself publicly invoked or 

relied upon the contents of the OLC Opinion. Grumman 

explained that the adoption exception only applies if “the 

reasoning in the [privileged document] is adopted by the 

[agency] as its reasoning.” 421 U.S. at 184 (emphasis added). 

The OIG’s references to the OLC Opinion do not establish that 

the FBI adopted the OLC Opinion as its own reasoning. Nor 

does Caproni’s response to inquiries from members of 

Congress establish that the FBI adopted the OLC Opinion’s 

reasoning as its own. Colborn explained that the OLC Opinion 

“has not been made public, and to the extent that it has been 

shared with others in the Government, these individuals would 

. . . only have been persons with an appropriate security 

clearance and a need to know—that is, individuals whose job 

responsibilities related to national security.” Colborn Decl. at 

6, reprinted in J.A. 23. Colborn made it clear that anyone who 

viewed the OLC Opinion “would have understood the need for 

confidentiality.” Id.

When Caproni mentioned the OLC Opinion during 

congressional hearings, she noted that “[m]any members of 

Congress have asked questions about this OLC opinion.” 

Caproni Testimony at 10, reprinted in J.A. 70. In other words, 

Caproni referenced the OLC Opinion in response to inquiries, 

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rather than affirmatively raising it to justify the FBI’s policy. 

Caproni’s testimony thus differs from the communications in 

Afshar, the congressional testimony in Brennan Center, and 

the statements in La Raza. In Afshar, the court found that the 

disputed memoranda in that case were predecisional when 

written, but the recommendations that they contained were not 

protected by the deliberative process privilege once they were 

“expressly adopted as the basis for agency action.” 702 F.2d at 

1140. In Brennan Center, a director of the agency explained 

that he changed positions “following” advice of OLC, and 

described that advice. 697 F.3d at 192. In La Raza, the District 

Court found that the Department of Justice had, “through the 

public statements of its representatives, incorporated the OLC 

Memorandum into Department policy.” 411 F.3d at 355. In 

contrast, Caproni never claimed that the FBI’s investigative 

tactics were justified by the OLC Opinion. To the contrary, she 

actually disavowed reliance on the OLC Opinion, stating that it 

“did not in any way factor into the FBI’s flawed practice of 

using exigent letters between 2003 and 2006 nor did it affect in 

any way the records-retention decisions made by the FBI as 

part of the reconciliation project.” Caproni Testimony at 10,

reprinted in J.A. 70. Far from publicly using the OLC Opinion 

to justify the FBI’s position, Caproni’s testimony indicates that 

the OLC Opinion did not determine the FBI’s actions or 

policy. 

D. Segregability

It is undisputed that under FOIA non-exempt information 

that is “reasonably segregable” from exempt information must 

be disclosed. 5 U.S.C. § 552(b). EFF contends that the District 

Court “erred by failing to determine whether there was 

unclassified, factual information within the OLC Opinion that 

was ‘reasonably segregable’ from the Opinion’s other 

content.” Br. for Appellant at 50. We disagree. In a section 

entitled “Segregability,” the District Court specifically held 

that “the Department has sufficiently established that no 

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portion of the OLC Opinion is reasonably segregable and 

releasable.” 892 F. Supp. 2d at 104. This holding is supported 

by the record. See Colborn Decl. at 5-7, reprinted in J.A.

22-24. 

In pressing its claim for segregability, EFF relies on Loving 

v. Dep’t of Defense for the proposition that “the deliberative 

process privilege does not protect documents in their entirety; 

if the government can segregate and disclose non-privileged 

factual information within a document, it must.” 550 F.3d 32, 

38 (D.C. Cir. 2008) (citing Army Times Publ’g Co. v. Dep’t of 

Air Force, 998 F.2d 1067, 1071 (D.C. Cir. 1993)). In response, 

the Government points out that:

The OLC declarant explained that “[t]hose portions of the 

Opinion that are marked unclassified reflect other 

confidential factual as well as confidential legal 

communications provided by the FBI to OLC for the 

purpose of obtaining legal advice.” This statement 

confirms that the entire document reflects the full and 

frank exchange of ideas between the FBI and OLC, and 

that revealing portions of the document would reveal the 

substance of those privileged communications.

Br. for Appellee at 40 (quoting Colborn Decl. at 5-6, reprinted 

in J.A. 22-23 (emphasis added)). 

We agree with the Government that EFF has “ignor[ed] the 

context in which factual statements were made [in asserting] 

that ‘factual material cannot generally be withheld under the 

deliberative process privilege.’” Id. (quoting Br. for Appellant 

at 51). In other words, because context matters, the proposition 

advanced by EFF is not inviolate. This point was made clear by 

the en banc court in Wolfe v. Dep’t of Health and Human Serv., 

839 F.2d 768 (D.C. Cir. 1988). In Wolfe, we explained that

[i]n some circumstances, even material that could be 

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characterized as “factual” would so expose the 

deliberative process that it must be covered by the 

privilege. We know of no case in which a court has used 

the fact/opinion distinction to support disclosure of facts 

about the inner workings of the deliberative process itself.

Id. at 774 (citation omitted); accord In re Sealed Case, 121 

F.3d 729, 737 (D.C. Cir. 1997) (“The deliberative process 

privilege does not shield . . . material that is purely factual, 

unless the material is so inextricably intertwined with the 

deliberative sections of documents that its disclosure would 

inevitably reveal the government's deliberations.”).

Based on the declarations provided by the Government, the 

District Court correctly concluded that “the unclassified 

portions of the OLC Opinion could not be released without 

harming the deliberative processes of the government by 

chilling the candid and frank communications necessary for 

effective governmental decision-making.” 892 F. Supp. 2d at 

104 (citation, quotations, and alterations omitted). The 

reasoning in Wolfe is thus controlling here.

E. Exemption 1

Because we find that the entire OLC Opinion is exempt 

from disclosure under the deliberative process privilege, there 

is no need for this court to determine whether certain portions 

of the OLC Opinion were properly withheld as classified under 

Exemption 1.

III. CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the judgment of the 

District Court.

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