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Homeland Security Secrecy Policy
Still Overreaching
By Project On Government Oversight
In January, the
Department of Homeland Security announced that it was backing down on its
earlier proposal to force employees to sign secrecy oaths that would prevent
them from sharing unclassified information with the public.
Scott Amey, General Counsel of POGO, issued the following statement:
"The Department of Homeland Security's revision of its policy for
handling sensitive information changes nothing. To ensure that secrecy oaths do
not happen, Congress must pass legislation and make its intent known. A
government agency should never threaten its employees or contractors with
criminal prosecution for disclosing information that is available under the Freedom
of Information Act.
Secrecy oaths allow government bureaucracies to hide corruption, waste,
fraud, and abuse from Congress and the public. Congress has historically taken
a strong stand against these secrecy oaths so that it can adequately perform
its oversight role. As the 9/11 Commission report noted, public disclosure is
"'democracy's best oversight mechanism.'"
Among the reasons why DHS' revised policy to prohibit public access to
information is still problematic:
--DHS still prevents employees from disclosing information that is available
to the public under the Freedom of Information Act.
--Employees will still be threatened with discipline even though they no
longer sign a nondisclosure agreement.
--Non-disclosure agreements with the threat of prosecution still apply to
contractors and consultants for revealing non-classified information.
--Any "employee, detailee, or contractor can designate
information" that should be withheld from the public. Experts in
classification have extensive training before being made responsible for
classifying. Whereas only 4,000 people classify information, 180,000 employees
plus thousands more contractors will be responsible for deciding what
information can be disclosed to the public.
--DHS includes a catch all statement that will in practice force employees
to withhold all information from the public: "Where the FOUO [For Official
Use Only] marking is not present on materials known by the holder to be FOUO,
the holder of the material will protect it as FOUO" (pg. 6).
Copies of the DHS memos were posted in January by the Federation of American
Scientists Project on Government Secrecy, which first exposed the secrecy oath,
at:
http://www.fas.org/sgp/news/secrecy/2005/01/011205.html
To learn more, see op-ed by POGO's Nick Schwellenbach and Peter Brand
"Dangerous Government Secrecy Oaths at:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20041202/news_lz4e2schwell.html
POGO investigates, exposes, and seeks to remedy systemic abuses of power, mismanagement,
and subservience by the federal government to powerful special interests.
Founded in 1981, POGO is a politically-independent, nonprofit watchdog that
strives to promote a government that is
accountable to the citizenry.