Court Opinion

ID: 9954538
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-26 16:01:35.424465+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:11:57.591091
License: Public Domain

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
                             FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

 JAMES MADISON PROJECT, et al.,

                        Plaintiffs,

                        v.                            Case No. 1:22-cv-00674 (TNM)

 OFFICE OF THE DIRECTOR OF
 NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE,

                        Defendant.

                                  MEMORANDUM OPINION

       Congress enacted the Freedom of Information Act in 1966, heeding the old adage that

“[s]unlight is . . . the best of disinfectants.” Louis D. Brandeis, What Publicity Can Do,

HARPER’S WEEKLY, Dec. 20, 1913, at 10. But even Justice Brandeis agreed that rule only

reached information to which the public “is fairly entitled.” Id. at 12. So Congress, taking a

similar tack, limited what information the Government must disclose under FOIA. See 5 U.S.C.

§ 552(b). This case is about those limits: Must the Government give Plaintiffs full, unredacted

access to an intelligence community report about Havana Syndrome? The answer is no. So the

Court will grant the Government’s Motions for Summary Judgment.

                                                 I.

       The James Madison Project is an organization devoted to “government accountability and

the reduction of secrecy.” Compl. ¶ 3, ECF No. 1. It, along with Brian Karem—the White

House correspondent for Playboy Magazine—sued the Office of the Director of National

Intelligence (ODNI) to obtain copies of a report on Havana Syndrome. See generally id. ODNI

produced a partially redacted copy of the report and pointed to a smorgasbord of agencies

responsible for those redactions: itself, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Central Intelligence
Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Army Research Laboratory, and the Air Force

Research Lab. See generally Decls., ECF Nos. 21-3–21-7, 28-3–28-5.

       The report Plaintiffs sought represented “ODNI’s intelligence assessment . . . regarding

the source of [Havana Syndrome].” Compl. ¶ 6. Havana Syndrome (referred to by the

Government as “anomalous health incidents,” or “AHIs”) is an umbrella term for a collection of

symptoms experienced by federal employees over the past several years. Redacted Report at 1,

ECF No. 21-4 Ex. D. Its name derives from its early appearance among employees of the U.S.

embassy in Havana, Cuba, and it manifests primarily as “a sudden sense of pressure or loud,

unpleasant sound” with common symptoms of “pain, nausea, dizziness, and cognitive

impairment.” Id.

       The Government turned over the report. See generally Redacted Report. But it was

heavily redacted. The Government withheld information under FOIA exemptions 1 (relating to

classified information), 3 (relating to information exempted from disclosure by statute), 5

(relating to information protected by a legal privilege), 6 (relating to private and personally

identifiable information), and 7(A), (C), and (E) (relating to law enforcement investigations and

investigatory practices). The redactions were extensive—sometimes shrouding entire pages of

the report with a black rectangle. E.g., id. at 47–57. So Plaintiffs sued ODNI to obtain an

unredacted copy. Compl. at 6.

       The Government moved for summary judgment, Mots. for Summ. J. (MSJ), ECF Nos. 21

& 28, and its motions are now ripe. But in January 2024, the Court ordered the Government to

supplement its motions. Order for Suppl. Mat’ls., ECF No. 32. The Court found that the

Government’s declarations were insufficiently specific about which agencies were responsible

for which withholdings, so the Court could not be confident that all withholdings were supported

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by one or more of the declarations. Id. After the Court’s Order, the Government supplied the

Court with an unredacted copy of the report, correlating each withholding to a particular agency.

The Court can now rule on the Government’s motions.

                                                 II.

       To obtain summary judgment, the movant (here, the Government) must show that “there

is no genuine dispute as to any material fact” and that it “is entitled to judgment as a matter of

law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). That standard helps implement summary judgment’s “core

purpose” of “avoid[ing] the expense of trial where a trial would be a ‘useless formality’ because

no factfinder could find for the nonmoving party.” Mass. Coal. for Immigr. Reform v. U.S. Dep’t

of Homeland Sec., --- F. Supp. 3d ---, 2023 WL 6388815, at *5 (D.D.C. Sept. 30, 2023) (quoting

Zweig v. Hearst Corp., 521 F.2d 1129, 1135–36 (9th Cir. 1975)). The “vast majority of FOIA

cases”—really, nearly all of them—“can be resolved on summary judgment.” Brayton v. Off. of

the U.S. Trade Rep., 641 F.3d 521, 527 (D.C. Cir. 2011).

       “The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requires that federal agencies make records

available to the public upon request, unless those records fall within one of nine exemptions.”

U.S. Fish & Wildlife Serv. v. Sierra Club, Inc., 592 U.S. 261, 263 (2021). To invoke one of

those exemptions in court, as the Government seeks to do here, the Government must “prov[e]

the applicability of [the] claimed exemptions.” ACLU v. U.S. Dep’t of Def., 628 F.3d 612, 619

(D.C. Cir. 2011). But that burden is low: “Ultimately, an agency’s justification for invoking a

FOIA exemption is sufficient if it appears ‘logical’ or ‘plausible.’” Larson v. Dep’t of State, 565

F.3d 857, 862 (D.C. Cir. 2009) (citation omitted). Once the Government has cleared that hurdle,

the burden shifts to the plaintiff. If a plaintiff wishes to rebut the Government’s claimed

exemption and survive summary judgment, he must “come forward with specific facts

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demonstrating that there is a genuine issue with respect to whether the agency has improperly

withheld extant agency records.” Span v. U.S. Dep’t of Just., 696 F. Supp. 2d 113, 119 (D.D.C.

2010) (cleaned up).

        Plaintiffs have abandoned their claims relating to exemptions 5, 6, 7(A), and 7(C). Opp’n

at 1, ECF No. 25. So the Court is left only with exemption 1 (the classified information

exemption), exemption 3 (the statutory carveout exemption), and exemption 7(E) (the law

enforcement techniques and procedures exemption). And there are some special rules for these

exemptions. Because courts “lack the expertise necessary to second-guess such agency opinions

in the typical national security FOIA case,” Krikorian v. Dep’t of State, 984 F.2d 461, 464 (D.C.

Cir. 1993) (cleaned up), the Court must “accord substantial weight to an agency’s affidavit

concerning the details of the classified status of the disputed record,” Wolf v. CIA, 473 F.3d 370,

374 (D.C. Cir. 2007). Indeed, agency affidavits alone are enough to require summary judgment

when they “describe the justifications for nondisclosure with reasonably specific detail” and “are

not controverted by either contrary evidence in the record nor by evidence of agency bad faith.”

Id. (citation omitted).

        Finally, because each exemption by itself justifies withholding, Plaintiffs’ challenge to a

given withholding fails if any one of the exemptions is valid. Larson, 565 F.3d at 862–63.

Applying those principles to this case, the Court will grant the Government’s motions for

summary judgment.

                                                III.

        Plaintiffs challenge three of the Government’s asserted FOIA exemptions: 1, 3, and 7(E).

That is, the classified information, statutory carveout, and law enforcement investigations

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exemptions. See 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(1), (b)(3), (b)(7)(E). The Court marches through each in

turn. All are justified.

                                                 A.

        Exemption 1 shields information that has been “specifically authorized under criteria

established by an Executive order to be kept secret in the interest of national defense or foreign

policy,” provided that it is “in fact properly classified pursuant to such Executive order.”

5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(1). The Government’s lift on this exemption is light. It need only describe the

justification for nondisclosure “with reasonably specific detail,” such that the Court can be

confident that the documents were properly classified. Wolf, 473 F.3d at 374. Unless Plaintiffs

can show that “the affidavits are deficient” because they are unspecific, conclusory, vague, or

sweeping, “the court need inquire no further into their veracity.” Hayden v. NSA, 608 F.2d 1381,

1387 (D.C. Cir. 1979). None of those deficiencies are present here.

        To start, Plaintiffs challenge the sufficiency of only one affidavit: that of Gregory Koch,

ODNI’s affiant. See Opp’n at 7–13; Koch Decl., ECF No. 21-3. Because they have not

challenged the sufficiency of the other affidavits, any such challenges have been forfeited. But

the Koch Declaration is enough to warrant summary judgment for the Government.

        Koch attests, under penalty of perjury, that he is an “original classification authority” for

ODNI, which is to say that he “make[s] original classification and declassification decisions for

intelligence information up to and including the TOP SECRET level.” Koch Decl. ¶ 3. He then

attests that he personally reviewed all the redacted information and confirmed it is properly

classified, consistent with the requirements of Executive Order 13526. Id. ¶ 30. Indeed, he

specifically articulates the bases under Executive Order 13526 justifying the classification—for

example, that some information pertains to “intelligence activities” or “intelligence sources and

                                                  5
methods.” Id. ¶ 31. And he attests that the disclosure of such information is reasonably likely to

harm national security—he even explains how. Id. ¶ 32. That is all that is needed.

       Plaintiffs disagree. They want Koch to “elaborate or provide . . . further clarity” on these

claims. Opp’n at 9. They do not clearly explain why such “further clarity” is needed. But,

charitably construed, they appear to be raising a claim that the Koch Declaration is “conclusory”

under Hayden. Not so.

       The Koch Declaration is as specific as it needs to be. It identifies particular bases for the

classification of the information at issue. Koch Decl. ¶ 31. And it specifies why that information

would likely harm national security if divulged. Id. ¶ 32. True enough, Koch does not say what

the classified material is or provide a factual synopsis. But he does not need to. Morley v. CIA,

508 F.3d 1108, 1124 (D.C. Cir. 2007) (“[L]ittle proof or explanation is required beyond a

plausible assertion that information is properly classified.”). In fact, requiring what Plaintiffs ask

for would defeat the whole point of exemption 1: Forcing Koch to detail the contents of the

withholdings and why they were classified would render their classification futile. Perhaps

recognizing the difficulty of claiming otherwise, Plaintiffs pivot.

       They next argue that the affidavit is insufficient because of a purported mismatch. They

say that, because Koch attests there is classified information in places they find odd, his affidavit

is untrustworthy. Opp’n at 9–10. For example, they ask why classified information would

appear in a panelist’s biography. Id. But the panelist biographies were not withheld under

exemption 1—they were withheld under exemption 3 and exemption 6, which Plaintiffs do not

challenge. See Redacted Report at C1–C13. And, in any event, the panelists include members of

the intelligence community. It is unsurprising that their biographies would reference classified

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material or their previous classified work. So the oddity Plaintiffs point to is only skin-deep. 1

The other purported oddities also have reasonable explanations: It stands to reason that

recommendations for the national security community would feature extensive amounts of

classified information. Contra Opp’n at 10.

           Ultimately, Plaintiffs challenge only one affidavit when it comes to exemption 1—

Koch’s. And that challenge fails. Because their only argument on this exemption is a non-

starter, the Court will grant summary judgment to the Government on its exemption 1

withholdings. 2 In the end, the Government has put forward multiple facially sufficient affidavits

to justify its withholdings, while Plaintiffs have offered nothing to controvert those affidavits or

suggest bad faith. Wolf, 473 F.3d at 374. Where, as here, the Government offers uncontroverted

evidence in support of its withholdings, “something, even a modest [showing], outweighs

nothing every time.” Nat’l Ass’n of Ret. Fed. Emps. v. Horner, 879 F.2d 873, 879 (D.C. Cir.

1989). 3

1
  Separately, the names of members of the intelligence community are properly withheld under
exemption 3, infra Part III.B, and providing their biographies would likely give away their
identities, circumventing the exemption 3 withholding.
2
  The Government has now filed with the Court an unredacted copy of the report, ex parte and
under seal. In the alternative to the reasons given above, the Court has independently reviewed
that report and concludes that the affidavits’ representations about the propriety of all three
exemptions’ withholdings appear justified.
3
 Although the Court concludes that the original declarations, standing alone, are enough to
support the exemptions, the Government has provided supplemental declarations in support of its
withholdings. Those declarations are “extra icing on a cake already frosted.” Yates v. United
States, 574 U.S. 528, 557 (2015) (Kagan, J., dissenting). If the Government’s showing was not
enough before, it certainly is now.

                                                  7
                                                 B.

       Exemption 3 carves out materials that are “specifically exempted from disclosure by

statute,” provided the statute meets certain criteria. 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(3). The Government has

identified the National Security Act and the Central Intelligence Agency Act as two statutes that

justify its exemption 3 withholdings. Mot. for Summ. J. (First Mot.) at 17–22, ECF No. 21.

Plaintiffs agree that these statutes, “in and of themselves, qualify as withholding statutes.”

Opp’n at 11. So the only question for the Court is whether the withheld material falls within the

statutes’ coverage. Morley, 508 F.3d at 1126.

       Both the Supreme Court and the D.C. Circuit have admonished district courts not to be

chary in their reading of exemption 3. Although it is not a categorical exemption from disclosure

for intelligence agencies, Phillippi v. CIA, 546 F.2d 1009, 1015 n.14 (D.C. Cir. 1976), neither

should courts be insensitive to the significant national security harms associated with improper

disclosure, CIA v. Sims, 471 U.S. 159, 174–76 (1985). Thus, while a blanket statement that

disclosure of information would “jeopardize the agency’s national security functions” is too

vague to pass muster, Church of Scientology of Calif., Inc. v. Turner, 662 F.2d 784, 785 (D.C.

Cir. 1980) (cleaned up), unspecific statements about expected resultant harms—like that

disclosure would “reveal cooperation with and perhaps the identity of a foreign intelligence

service or a covert intelligence source”—are enough, id. at 786.

       The Government’s declarations met this burden. The Defense Intelligence Agency’s

declaration, for instance, explained that revealing the withheld information would “reveal

intelligence sources and methods” in a way that “would allow adversaries to employ

countermeasures, thus reducing the effectiveness of the sources and methods as intelligence

collection tools.” Cross-Davison Decl. ¶ 23, ECF No. 21-5. Similarly, the CIA declaration

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made clear that revealing the withheld information would “expose the identities of CIA

personnel, which could subject them to harassment or unwanted contact.” Williams Decl. ¶ 28,

ECF No. 21-6. These explanations are representative of those offered by each agency here. 4

        In response, Plaintiffs argue that the Government’s assertions of harm are “self-serving

and conclusory.” Opp’n at 11. Not so. The Circuit drew a clear line in Church of Scientology to

separate impermissibly conclusory assertions from sufficiently detailed ones. Church of

Scientology, 662 F.2d at 785–86. These declarations—though circumspect—fall on the latter

side of that line.

        Plaintiffs’ remaining objections largely revolve around the length of the sections to be

withheld. Opp’n at 12. But that is not the test. The Government could withhold the entire

document if it could show that it all fell within some exemption’s remit. 5 And despite Plaintiffs’

contentions, the Government’s paragraph-long withholdings bear no resemblance to those

discussed in Phillippi. Id. at 11. The Government does not suggest that all information related

to CIA activities is protected from disclosure. See Phillippi, 546 F.2d at 1015 n.14. So

Plaintiffs’ invocation of the Phillippi footnote is simply off base.

        Last, Plaintiffs again suggest that it would be odd to find protected information in certain

portions of the report. Why, they ask again, would the biographies of panelists be exempted

from disclosure? Opp’n at 12. Again, the answer is simple: The National Security Act bars

disclosure of the “names, official titles, salaries, or number of personnel employed” by certain

intelligence community agencies. 50 U.S.C. § 3507. And the panelist biographies may well

4
  The Government’s explanations of expected harm here go well beyond what was required by
statute. See 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(8)(B).
5
 Of course, the length of the Government’s withholdings might separately bear on the
segregability analysis, discussed further below. Infra Part III.D.

                                                  9
contain sufficient information to identify the panelists, even without their names. But, once

more, the length or location of the withheld information is not material to whether it is exempted

from disclosure, so long as the claimed exemption is supported by a competent agency

declaration, as those here were. Under these circumstances, the Government’s exemptions

“appear[] logical or plausible,” and therefore pass muster. ACLU, 628 F.3d at 619 (internal

quotation marks omitted).

       Exemptions 1 and 3 both require that a “reasonable balance . . . be struck between the

competing congressionally-sanctioned policies of public access to government information, on

the one hand, and maintenance of a functioning intelligence-gathering system, on the other.”

Church of Scientology, 662 F.2d at 787. The Government’s representations here strike that

balance. They are detailed enough for the Court to conclude that the withheld information falls

within one or more of the FOIA exemptions, without divulging overly detailed information to the

public. Although Plaintiffs may want more, more is not required.

                                                C.

       Exemption 7(E) protects from disclosure “records or information compiled for law

enforcement purposes” that could “disclose techniques and procedures for law enforcement

investigations or prosecutions,” among other things. 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(7)(E). The FBI invoked

this exemption to cover various withholdings that would reveal methods for “collection and

analysis of information and sensitive investigative techniques used to conduct national security

investigations.” First Mot. at 34. And the Government explained the harms that would result

from such disclosure. Seidel Decl. ¶ 32, ECF No. 21-7.

       Plaintiffs concede that exemption 7(E) “sets a low bar” for the Government. Opp’n at 13.

Yet they argue the Government has failed to meet that bar because it has invoked exemption 7(E)

                                                10
for the entirety of Appendix J. Id. Again though, the Government has explained the sensitive

law enforcement information contained within Appendix J and the harm that would result from

its disclosure. Seidel Decl. ¶¶ 32–33. So the mere fact that the exempt information covers a

long passage in the report is immaterial.

       And it cannot be true, as Plaintiffs suggest, that the FBI must disclose to them the

withheld material to protect that material from disclosure. Opp’n at 13. Plaintiffs identify, as

justification sufficient to support invoking exemption 7(E), an FBI declaration in a prior case that

provided “details about procedures used during forensic examination.” Id. (citing Blackwell v.

FBI, 646 F.3d 37, 42 (D.C. Cir. 2011)). But that level of detail, while sufficient, is unnecessary.

Indeed, under Plaintiffs’ theory, exemption 7(E) is curiously self-defeating. It would require

divulging the exact information the Government seeks to withhold in order to justify the

withholding. Instead, the Government need only provide the Court enough information for it to

reasonably conclude that the withheld materials do, in fact, pertain to confidential law

enforcement techniques and practices. Because the Government has detailed how the withheld

information does so, and the harm that would result from its disclosure, the Court finds that the

exemption 7(E) withholding is reasonable. 6

6
  Plaintiffs make no argument about the reasonably foreseeable harm requirement from the FOIA
Improvement Act of 2016. See 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(8)(A)(i). But if it had, the Government would
easily satisfy § 552(a)(8)(A)(i). Cf. Reporters Comm. for Freedom of the Press v. U.S. Customs
& Border Patrol, 567 F. Supp. 3d 97, 120 (D.D.C. 2021) (noting foreseeable harm requirement
is more easily met when invoking exemptions for which the risk of harm through disclosure is
self-evident). Reasonably foreseeable harm is always present when the Government properly
invokes exemption 1, because significant harm from disclosure is a requirement for classification
in the first place. More, the requirement does not apply to exemption 3. 5 U.S.C.
§ 552(a)(8)(B). And the Government has explained at length the harms that would result from
disclosure of the 7(E) materials. E.g., Seidel Decl. ¶ 33.

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                                                 D.

       Last, Plaintiffs argue that the Government “has simply failed to present credible evidence

that there are no further segregable portions of the released records.” Opp’n at 14. They provide

no support for this claim, except for the assertion that “[a]ll [the Government] provides is a self-

serving sentence that it has determined no further information can be segregated.” Id. But the

Government provided a reasonably detailed statement supporting its claim on non-segregability.

Koch certified that he reviewed the record “on a line-by-line and page-by-page basis” and

determined that there was “no additional meaningful, non-exempt information that may be

reasonably segregated and released” without disclosing exempt information. Koch Decl. ¶ 47.

       This is substantively identical to the declaration approved by the D.C. Circuit in

Machado Amadis v. U.S. Department of State, 971 F.3d 364, 371–72 (D.C. Cir. 2020). Because

the Circuit found that declaration sufficient, the Court likewise finds that the Koch Declaration is

sufficient here. Koch certified under pain of perjury that he reviewed the report and determined

that no further information was segregable. Koch Decl. ¶ 47. And because the Government

cannot prove the negative assertion that no other segregable information exists, that type of

declaration must be sufficient to carry its burden. The Court therefore concludes that the

Government has satisfied its burden to show that it has disclosed all non-exempt reasonably

segregable information to Plaintiffs.

                                                IV.

       FOIA is a broad statute designed to grant the public access to the Government’s inner

workings. But it is not a cudgel to force disclosure of sensitive national security information.

Armed with little more than speculation about what the redacted document may say, Plaintiffs

invoke FOIA to try to force the intelligence community to divulge secrets they cannot otherwise

                                                 12
obtain. Then Plaintiffs turn around and say the intelligence community’s unwillingness to give

them that information is itself proof that it must. FOIA does not countenance such a strategy to

outmaneuver its exemptions. The Government has met its obligations under the statute, so the

Court will grant the Government’s Motions for Summary Judgment. A separate Order will issue

today.

                                                                         2024.03.26
                                                                         09:46:28 -04'00'
Dated: March 26, 2024                               TREVOR N. McFADDEN, U.S.D.J.

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