October 2019 FOIA Litigation with Five-Year Monthly Trends

During the month of October 2019 federal district courts saw a total of 96 new Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits filed under 5 U.S.C. 552. To place this number in perspective, 96 new filings compares with a monthly average of 73 filings during the last 12 months. This month’s total brought overall FOIA filings on an annual basis for these last 12 months to 872.

The figure below provides a more detailed view of monthly trends during the past five years. The height of each bar reflects the number of filings in that month. To see the actual filing count mouse over any bar. The superimposed line over the bars is the moving 12-month average. It is computed by adding up the 12 months ending at a given month, and then dividing that total by 12 to obtain the monthly average over this period. Mousing over any bar also shows the calculated result for this moving average for that given month.

Locating additional details on these cases: The FOIA Project compiles summaries of each of these cases written by Harry Hammitt for FOIAproject.org into a weekly blog posting. These typically are posted every Thursday. For recent postings see:

* November 15, 2019: AMERICAN OVERSIGHT v. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE and 21 other new FOIA lawsuits, plus case descriptions.

* November 7, 2019: PROTECT DEMOCRACY PROJECT, INC. v. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE et al and 11 other new FOIA lawsuits.

* October 31, 2019: Sierra Club v. United States Securities and Exchange Commission and 16 other new FOIA lawsuits.

* October 24, 2019: CENTER FOR REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS v. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES and 26 other new FOIA lawsuits.

* October 17, 2019: SNYDER v. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE and 17 other new FOIA lawsuits, plus case descriptions.

Documents in each case, including the complaint that was filed and the court’s docket sheet, are available elsewhere on FOIAproject.org. They can be found by using the “Search Lawsuits” tool under the “FOIA Lawsuits” menu.