"kind of like sending requests through a portal into a void."
"it was quite intimidating and it did feel very hopeless,"
"the reporting team worked for years - filing more than 700 FOIA requests and six lawsuits - to tell this story, which also included locating and interviewing 39 U.S. Marines who were involved in the event being described, many of whom had never been interviewed."
"The way it works is you get a lawyer and you sue the federal government. And just a plug. 'cause I know resources are always a question around litigating over FOIA, FOIA has a fee recovery provision written into it. So if you sue the federal government and you win, your lawyer can often get paid by the federal government...They're obligated under the law to give you anyway, but it is often very obvious to an attorney when the government has not met their really basic statutory requirements."
Requests for federal records often feel like being sent into a portal into a void and can be more intimidating and hopeless than dealing with local officials. Investigative reporting reconstructed a deadly Haditha massacre by filing more than 700 FOIA requests and six lawsuits and locating and interviewing 39 U.S. Marines, winning major awards. Successful federal records access can require suing the federal government because FOIA contains a fee-recovery provision that can cover lawyers if plaintiffs prevail. Additional tactics include learning and avoiding agency-specific triggers and maintaining polite, constructive communication with agency staff.
Read at Poynter
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