Jason Leopold Profile picture
Sep 29, 2022 6 tweets 5 min read Read on X
NEW: Remember when Trump took a trip to Japan back in 2019 and reports surfaced that the WH requested the move the USS John McCain out of view so it wouldn't upset Trump?

Well, I #FOIA'd the military for docs about this & 3 yrs later they just arrived

"This just makes me sad"
The White House Military Office passed along a request to keep the USS John McCain out of sight when Trump visited Japan.
How the sequence of events unfolded. An email describing how the directives to keep the USS John McCain out of sight during Trump's 2019 visit to Japan were passed to US Indo-Pacific Command and the Navy
Navy officials wanted names of the individuals responsible for requesting the USS John McCain be kept out of view during Trump's visit to Japan. They seem stunned.
All of the White House Military Office emails about the discussions to keep the USS John McCain out of sight during Trump's visit to Japan are classified and redacted except for one.
NEW: Here's the story & 109 pages of emails I rec'd from US Indo Pacific Command in response to my #FOIA request about the Trump WH's request to keep the USS John McCain "out of sight" during Trump's Japan visit & what went on behind the scenes
bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

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More from @JasonLeopold

May 5
SCOOP: The Trump administration is “decommissioning” a Department of Justice office that been at the center of dismantling transnational organized crime networks, drug cartels and human trafficking rings

bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
Leaders of the unit, called the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces, or OCDETF, were told they had until Sept. 30 to shut down operations.
An email sent last Monday by a DOJ budget analyst to a counterpart at OCDETF said that the unit’s fiscal year 2026 budget would be “zeroed out” and the independent office dissolved, according to records I obtained in response to a #FOIA request people familiar with the matter.
Read 6 tweets
Feb 21
NEW FOIA Files newsletter is out

USAID told me it can’t release documents via #FOIA due to “recent developments”

Meanwhile, a memo I obtained sent to DHS FOIA officers this week directs them to “maximize transparency” when processing FOIA requests
bloomberg.com/news/newslette…
Just a month into Trump’s second presidency, the FOIA has made its way into the swirling, political chaos. The administration’s mass firings of federal employees has impacted FOIA operations at some agencies, jeopardizing the public’s ability to access records.
A few weeks ago, USAID was targeted for closure by billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. Nearly all of USAID’s employees were fired or placed on administrative leave.
Read 11 tweets
Feb 14
A FOIA Files SCOOP: Elon Musk’s DOGE Targets #FOIA Requests at Agency Under its Purview

DOGE also wants to be notified when there’s any attempt at oversight from Congress, inspectors general, even the Government Accountability Office. Image
Earlier this week, I reported on DOGE’s takeover of the CFPB. One of the standout documents I reviewed was an “Assignment Agreement,” or a memorandum of understanding between DOGE and CFPB that bears the seal of the Executive Office of the President.
It explained that authority for the CFPB operation emanated from a Jan. 20 executive order and would center on “software modernization.” It also said DOGE "will discuss projects and the overall engagement with CFPB on an as needed basis."
Read 7 tweets
Dec 20, 2024
NEW: The last edition of FOIA Files this year! This week, we’re going out on a lighter note & highlighting the Deep Cuts—the redacted, obscure & overlooked docs buried in stacks of newsworthy releases that are so good they could have been hit singles!
bloomberg.com/news/newslette…
Thank you to everyone who has subscribed and helped make my weekly newsletter a success. It’s been an amazing 1st year, despite the fact that govt agencies have tried to wear me down by throwing roadblocks in my way. But I’m well aware that obtaining documents via FOIA is a battle so I was prepared.
Since I launched FOIA Files nine months ago, I’ve liberated more than 6,000 pages of documents on a wide-range of issues and shared them with the public. (If you missed any of the previous 35 editions you can find them here.)
bloomberg.com/authors/AV1xN7…
Read 4 tweets
Dec 15, 2024
🧵 If you can spare a couple of hours, please read this groundbreaking, yearlong global investigation by my @business colleagues into the money, opportunity & exploitation into the booming fertility industry. I guarantee once you start reading you won't be able to stop

🎁 bloomberg.com/graphics/2024-…
To tell its story, my colleagues follow a teenage girl in India, lured into selling her eggs; a model in Argentina whose genetic makeup is prized; a mother in Greece, told by police that her eggs were stolen; and two “egg girls” from Taiwan who have put themselves at risk to earn money in the US.
This project began when Kanoko Matsuyama, a health-care reporter in Bloomberg’s Tokyo bureau, noticed that private equity firms were snapping up in vitro fertilization clinics around the world
Read 9 tweets
Nov 22, 2024
🔎 Here's the backstory about the ODNI intelligence memo on Putin campaign to assassinate his enemies I exclusively obtained after pursuing it for years.

🧵 Image
Lawmakers tucked language inside a 2016 intelligence spending bill that tasked ODNI with preparing a classified intelligence assessment for the committees. Specifically, it was to be about “the use of political assassinations as a form of statecraft by the Russian Federation since January 1, 2000.”Image
The directive from Congress, which the public was unaware of at the time, also called for ODNI to produce a list of prominent Russians, including politicians, businessmen and journalists, “that the intelligence community assesses were assassinated by Russian Security Services”
Read 15 tweets

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