Elizabeth Warren, the head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, recently appeared before Congress to answer questions concerning what one U.S. Representative considered her agency's "inadequate" responses to Freedom of Information Act requests, according to the Washington Examiner.
As chairman, Representative Darrell Issa, a Republican from California, oversaw the discussion before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Specifically, the questioning centered on the documents watchdog group Judicial Watch received from the CFPB, which was created last year and given power to regulate consumer products.
According to the Washington Examiner, Issa held out a document that was provided to Judicial Watch by the Department of Treasury, within which the CFPB falls. He said the amount of redacted information rendered the document useless, adding that it was difficult to decipher its subject matter.
Issa urged Warren to fully comply with Judicial Watch's FOIA request once the CFPB officially opens its doors on July 21.
On July 4, the 45th anniversary of the federal FOIA, the National Security Archive released a report that showed government agencies are still slow to respond to declassification processing requests. Referral processes, when agencies claim ownership of documents to block their release, are responsible for many holdups, the report stated.
