2002 INTEL BUDGET TOTAL EXEMPT FROM FOIA, COURT RULES
The 2002 intelligence budget total is exempt from disclosure
under the Freedom of Information Act, a federal court judge has
ruled, because that number, which was around $35 billion,
"relates to intelligence sources or methods that the DCI must
protect."
The ruling by D.C. District Judge Ricardo M. Urbina, dated
February 6 and disclosed today, came in a Freedom of Information
Act lawsuit against the Central Intelligence Agency brought by
the Federation of American Scientists.
Last April, Director of Central Intelligence George J. Tenet
swore under penalty of perjury that disclosure of the total
intelligence budget for 2002 -- a single number encompassing the
intelligence-related expenditures of more than a dozen agencies
-- would damage national security and compromise sources and
methods.
Given the DCI's personal intervention, the court's ruling was no
great surprise. To have ordered budget disclosure would have
been to publicly call George Tenet a liar.
And yet the decision is a disappointment, since it means that
there is no one in authority who will stand up and say that CIA
budget secrecy is wrong on the merits.
By any rational measure, it is simply not true that disclosing
the intelligence budget total would damage national security or
intelligence methods. That is why a growing number of foreign
democracies publish the size of their intelligence accounts.
That is also why the CIA itself disclosed the 1997 and 1998
budget totals ($26.6 and $26.7 billion, respectively), in
response to previous litigation.
Judge Urbina, who often issues rulings that are models of
discernment and empathy, in this case declined to confront the
core dispute or to exercise independent review of CIA's
substantive claims. His decision is here:
fas.org |
