Thread by @realjusthuman

Huddleston v. Federal Bureau of Investigation
(Seth Rich FOIA case)

The expected filing(s) have arrived.

There is a joint filing by the parties and then an unopposed motion by the plaintiffs. Let's look at the joint filing first.

"The FBI intends to seek reconsideration and clarification of the November 28, 2023 Memorandum and Opinion"

The FBI want the judge to reconsider his determinations that:

-The "Work Laptop" is a FOIA'able agency record.

-requiring the FBI to prepare and provide Vaughn indexes or produce metadata

If the Court does not reconsider and/or reaffirms its order, then the FBI will argue that the Work Laptop is exempt from FOIA under Exemption 7(A) and that the CD containing images of the Personal Laptop is exempt under both 7(A) and 7(D).

7(A)= could reasonably be expected to interfere with law enforcement proceedings

7(D)= could reasonably be expected to disclose the identity of a confidential source

"the FBI proposes the Court enter a briefing schedule for the FBI’s anticipated motions. The FBI proposes to file its combined motion for reconsideration, or in the alternative, motion for summary judgment on or before February 8, 2024."

"Perhaps unsurprisingly, the FBI has thumbed its nose at that order. Rather than provide a suggested timeline, the FBI has moved the Court to give it yet another extension of time so it can file yet another motion for reconsideration and clarification."

The FBI did not respond to Plaintiffs attempts to coordinate this joint filing and propose a schedule.

Instead they waited until final hours of the day the filing was due to inform Plaintiffs that it would not be proposing a timeline as ordered and would instead ask for more time.

"Notably, the FBI’s Office of General Counsel was willing to stay open until after 9 p.m. EST this evening just to produce the non-responsive excerpt above, so surely it can burn a little midnight oil to petition the Court of Appeals. Perhaps a hard production deadline from this Court will inspire the FBI to fish or cut bait."

"The FBI originally claimed it had no records whatsoever about Seth Rich, but little by little the FBI was forced to admit that it had thousands of pages of responsive documents, id., not to mention his work laptop, a copy of his personal laptop contents, a DVD, and a tape drive. See Memorandum 24.

After more than six years of delays and denials, it is time for the FBI to come clean. A Presidential election is fast approaching, and voters have the right to know (1) whether the FBI knowingly framed one of the frontrunners, i.e., former President Trump; and (2) whether the FBI is still trying to cover up its partisan political activities."

"Mr. Huddleston made the Court aware of the May 12, 2023 Report on Matters Related to Intelligence Activities and Investigations Arising Out of the 2016 Presidential Campaigns (“Durham Report”) (Dkt. #133-1), wherein Special Counsel John Durham documented the FBI’s attempts to frame President Donald J. Trump with false allegations that President Trump colluded with Russian agents."

"The FBI and the Department of Justice have admitted that there is a direct link between Seth Rich’s work laptop and Russian “collusion.”

"they have admitted that there is a direct link between Seth Rich’s work laptop and the purported “hacking” of Democratic National Committee emails that were later published by Wikileaks in 2016."

It is bad enough that FBI personnel took opposition research from the Hillary Clinton campaign and used it to open a bad-faith investigation of Mr. Trump, thereby sabotaging him for more than two years. See, generally, Durham Report 85, 95, 97, 98, and 304-305. It would be considerably worse and considerably more scandalous, however, if FBI personnel knew all along that Seth Rich – not Russian hackers – was responsible for leaking DNC emails to Wikileaks. If the FBI and Justice Department have kept that fraud under wraps for more than seven years, then the electorate may rightly ask what else the FBI and Justice Department have been doing to frame and/or sabotage President Trump. In particular, voters might ask whether the Justice Department’s ongoing prosecutions of Mr. Trump are politically motivated."

"All of the cards should be on the table in advance of the 2024 Presidential election. Mr. Huddleston therefore submits that the FBI should be compelled to produce the lion’s share of responsive documents not less than 120 days before the November 5, 2024 Presidential election."

"In an effort to narrow the scope of the search for responsive records and make that deadline achievable, Mr. Huddleston proposes the following search and production sequence:"

-Metadata within 21 days of courts order

-all emails or communications from March 14, 2016 until July 10, 2016 that meet the following criteria:

Emails or communitications which mention:
Wikileaks
Julian Assange
Ebay
Pratt Wiley
John Podesta
Conflict among coworkers
Threats of any kind
Pizza

-"Next, the FBI should search for, review, and produce files of any kind that reference or relate to eBay, Wikileaks, Julian Assange, Pratt Wiley, John Podesta, “pizza,” or electronic payments (e.g., Zelle, PayPal, or Bitcoin)."

-"After the metadata and file names have been produced to Mr. Huddleston pursuant to Paragraph 1, he should be allowed to designate and prioritize specific files for review and production."

"“The value of information is partly a function of time."

"...this case has been considerable, and the level of public interest is high, therefore Mr. Huddleston proposes a production rate of 20,000 pages per month."

Link to filing
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco…

The other filing to look at is an unopposed request for clarification.

"The Plaintiff would note that the Court has not yet ruled on Plaintiff’s Cross-Motion for Partial Summary Judgment (Dkt. #105) or Plaintiff’s Corrected Motion for Summary Judgment (Dkt. #112), at least not explicitly, and those motions seek records not covered by the motions found at Dkt. #73 and #77. He therefore moves the Court to clarify whether the November 28, 2023 Order was intended to resolve Dkt. #105 and #112 as well as Dkt. #73 and #77."

storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco…