Opinion ID: 741053
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Attorney-client and Work-product Privileges.

Text: 14 Bartholdi first contends that the Commission's rejection of the privilege claims does not reflect reasoned decisionmaking. We need not reach that issue as we conclude that Bartholdi's claims of privilege were not properly raised before the Commission. Section 405 of the Communications Act provides that the Commission must be afforded an opportunity to pass on an issue as a condition precedent to judicial review. 47 U.S.C. § 405(a)(2). In this case, Bartholdi raised its privilege claims, if at all, only before the WTB. Bartholdi's application for review to the Commission made no mention of either the attorney-client or work-product privilege. Under the plain language of Section 405, an issue cannot be preserved for judicial review simply by raising it before a Bureau of the FCC. It is the Commission itself that must be afforded the opportunity to pass on the issue. Id.; cf. Parsippany Hotel Management Co. v. NLRB, 99 F.3d 413, 418 (D.C.Cir.1996) (holding that issue raised before ALJ, but not NLRB, was not preserved). 15 Bartholdi contends that it preserved the privilege claims by attaching an affidavit discussing the issue to its application for review filed with the Commission. In a similar vein, Bartholdi claims that a footnote in its application for review incorporating all claims made before the WTB was sufficient to preserve the issue for our review. We reject each of these arguments. The Commission need not sift pleadings and documents to identify arguments that are not stated with clarity by a petitioner. See WAIT Radio v. FCC, 418 F.2d 1153, 1157 (D.C.Cir.1969), cert. denied, 409 U.S. 1027, 93 S.Ct. 461, 34 L.Ed.2d 321 (1972). It is the [324 U.S.App.D.C. 426] petitioner that has the burden of clarifying its position before the agency. Northside Sanitary Landfill, Inc. v. Thomas, 849 F.2d 1516, 1519 (D.C.Cir.1988), cert. denied, 489 U.S. 1078, 109 S.Ct. 1528, 103 L.Ed.2d 833 (1989). In this case, Bartholdi failed to carry that burden. Bartholdi should have assumed at least a modicum of responsibility for flagging the relevant issues which its documentary submissions presented. Id.; see also Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. NRDC, 435 U.S. 519, 553, 98 S.Ct. 1197, 1216, 55 L.Ed.2d 460 (1978). By failing to do so, Bartholdi waived its privilege claims. Bartholdi, however, argues that even if it failed to raise the privilege claims before the Commission, the claims are properly before us because they were actually addressed by the Commission. We disagree. The mere fact that the Commission discusses an issue does not mean that it was provided a meaningful opportunity to pass on the issue. It is only through the adversarial process (or analogous circumstances) that the Commission is afforded such an opportunity within the meaning of § 405. 16 We, of course, recognize that § 405 does not require that the party seeking judicial review of an issue be the party that provided the Commission with the opportunity to pass on the issue. As a result, we have considered issues that were addressed by the Commission after being presented by someone other than the petitioner. E.g., Office of Communication of the United Church of Christ v. FCC, 779 F.2d 702, 707 (D.C.Cir.1985) (considering issue raised before the Commission by another party); Office of Communication of the United Church of Christ v. FCC, 465 F.2d 519, 523-24 (D.C.Cir.1972) (considering issue raised by dissenting commissioners). But petitioner cites no case in which we held that the mere fact that the Commission addressed an issue was sufficient to preserve the issue for judicial review. Indeed, we have rejected such arguments in analogous contexts. Cf. Local 900 Int'l Union of Elec., Radio and Mach. Workers v. NLRB, 727 F.2d 1184, 1191 (D.C.Cir.1984) (holding that discussion of an issue by the NLRB did not necessarily prove compliance with § 10(e) of the NLRA requiring that issues be raised before the Board in order to obtain judicial review of such); Parsippany Hotel, 99 F.3d at 418 (holding that discussion of an issue in an ALJ opinion adopted by the Board was insufficient to satisfy the requirements of § 10(e) of the NLRA); Burkhart v. WMATA, 112 F.3d 1207, 1215 (D.C.Cir.1997) (holding that district court's discussion of an alternative ground for its decision did not undermine its ruling that appellant's claim was untimely raised). 1 17 In any event, Bartholdi's challenge to the Commission's ruling on the privilege claims must fail. The Commission rejected Bartholdi's claims of privilege on the ground that they were not substantiate[d]. 11 F.C.C.R. at 2477. We have repeatedly held that the party claiming a privilege has the burden of present[ing] to the court sufficient facts to establish the privilege. In re Sealed Case, 737 F.2d 94, 99 (D.C.Cir.1984). Bartholdi's application for review filed with the Commission made no mention of the attorney-client or work-product privileges, much less attempted to establish the existence of such. Under these circumstances, we cannot find the Commission's rejection of the privilege claims to be arbitrary or capricious. 18