You paid for it, it acts in your name, and it keeps a file on you — but try asking to see any of it. Requests sat for years. Exemptions were stamped on everything. Records got "lost." This statute inverts the default: government operates in public, and secrecy is the exception that has to be justified — with real deadlines, real consequences, and no reason required to ask. Curiosity is enough.
A FOIA request could sit for years. Agencies stamped blanket exemptions on whole categories of documents and dared you to sue over it.Check it
Fees were used as a weapon — quote a journalist thousands of dollars and the request goes away.Check it
Agencies met behind closed doors. The government held a file on you that you couldn’t see and couldn’t correct when it was wrong.Check it
And when a record became inconvenient, it could simply disappear — with the watchdogs who’d notice fired at will.Check it
Acknowledgment in 5 business days, a substantive response in 20. Claiming an exemption means explaining, in writing, how that specific document meets its precise definition. Blanket categories don’t cut it.
You never have to explain why you want a record. Curiosity is a sufficient basis. Fees are limited to real duplication costs — not used as a wall.
Multi-member agencies meet in the open, with notice, defined closure grounds, and judicial review of any closure.
You can see, correct, and control the records the government keeps about you. Presidential records must be preserved — destruction is prohibited — and Inspectors General can’t be fired to make a problem go away.
Requests languished for years, exemptions were asserted by category, and you often had to justify why you wanted to know.Check it
Any person, any record, any format — no reason required. Acknowledged in 5 business days, substantive response in 20. An expedited 10-day track covers threats to life, urgent public interest, and due-process loss — and the agency bears the burden of showing you don’t qualify.
"Exempt" was stamped on everything, and fee quotes in the thousands quietly killed inconvenient requests.Check it
An exemption requires a detailed written explanation of how the specific document meets the specific exemption — blanket references are insufficient. Fees are limited to actual duplication, so cost can’t be used as a barricade.
Agencies deliberated in private and announced the outcome.Check it
Meetings of multi-member agencies are open, with required notice, defined grounds for closure, and judicial review when they close. The deliberation is the public’s too.
The government held records about you that you couldn’t access, couldn’t correct, and couldn’t stop from being passed around.Check it
Access, correction, and deletion rights over the records the government holds about you, with limits on inter-agency transfer. Your file isn’t theirs to hold in the dark.
Presidential and White House records could be destroyed, and the loss discovered too late to matter.Check it
All presidential and White House records must be preserved and transferred — destruction is prohibited. The Archivist gets independent authority, and every agency carries real records-management obligations.
An Inspector General closing in on wrongdoing could simply be removed.Check it
Inspector General independence: removal review and full authority during any transition — you can’t fire the watchdog to end the investigation. And any person denied access has a private right of action.
This is the plain-language version. The binding text is CS-18, which implements Article Four, Section 11 of the Constitution.
This is your country’s law. Help shape the next draft of it.
