Chicago Mayor Promises To Turn Over Emails From His Private Accounts Following Courtroom Losses
from the getting-right-in-on-the-eighth-or-ninth-floor-of-the-inevitable dept
Not only is the use of private email accounts to route around public records requests a common practice, it's also an accepted practice. Politicians aren't going to sell out their own in the name of transparency, so there's likely as many private email accounts handling official business as there are government employees. Everyone from former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg to Gen. Colin Powell has used private email accounts to handle government communications they'd rather not be made public.
The same goes for Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel. For years, journalists and government transparency groups have been trying (and suing) to get the mayor to turn over city-related emails contained in his personal accounts. To date, the city of Chicago hasn't budged.
But we're living in a "new" era of Chicago-brand transparency -- the aftermath of the city's concerted cover-up of police recordings of the Laquan McDonald shooting. The mayor pledged the city would be more open and forthcoming in the future -- not a difficult promise to make considering there was nowhere to go but up.
Roughly a year after that announcement, one layer of opacity has been peeled back by the mayor's office. Given that it was prompted by multiple lawsuits and unsympathetic court rulings, it's probably best to hold any applause until something more proactive is witnessed.
As a result of a BGA [Better Government Association] investigation and legal action, The City of Chicago and Mayor Rahm Emanuel have agreed to release all of Emanuel's private emails related to city business—subject to any applicable legal exemptions—and institute a new policy that will ban city employees and officials from using their private email accounts to conduct city business.
The city's change in practices comes in response to Freedom of Information Act requests and lawsuits filed by the BGA, and separately by the Chicago Tribune, and follows more than a year of hard-fought litigation and rulings by two Cook County judges that public officials’ emails are not outside the scope of FOIA simply because they are on a private account.
If this clenched-teeth transparency sounds familiar, it's probably because Mayor Emanuel -- like the president he briefly worked for -- has promised unheard of levels of transparency…
Emanuel claimed from the start of his tenure at City Hall in 2011 that his leadership would be among the most transparent in the nation.
and delivered almost none of it.
But accessing public records at City Hall—especially documents about hot topics of those pertaining directly to the mayor himself—has often been met with delays, obfuscation or court battles.
And so it goes. This is an important victory for the public, moved along by court rulings stating pretty much the same thing Chicago's administrative branch is only now conceding: official business is official business, whether it's carried out on official email accounts or not. The new policy prompted by lawsuits and court losses orders city employees to push any work-related emails received on personal accounts to their city of Chicago accounts or face whatever form of discipline the city deems appropriate. The latter half of this sentence will dictate the success of the first half, so it's up to city employees to keep other city employees honest. Considering this is Chicago, birthplace of the mobbed-up politician, I expect it will be several more years before the city even begins to approach the lofty transparency goals its own mayor has shown no interest in attaining.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: chicago, emails, foia, private emails, public records, rahm emanuel
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
He learned from the best
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: He learned from the best
What if whoever phished Podesta's email
had included a click through EULA which
included an admission that by clicking
this EULA, Podesta's emails would become
available, and might later be made public?
As we know, no one actually reads EULA's,
so Podesta would have clicked through, and
thereby given explicit permission to
publish all of his emails.
Worse still, the hacker would then have
*not committed any crime*, and so could
not be prosecuted.
So if you're going phishing, you might
want to create a phishing license.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
No good…
This is why mobsters and Chicago politicians use guns instead. ;]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Oh, spare us.
Secretaries of State Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice used private accounts for classified emails. In fact Colin Powell advised Hillary to do so.
Then there's Bush II, Cheney, Rove and anyone else connected to the Bush White House email controversy, tens of millions of White House emails sent through private servers. Millions of them lost. With the same security issues.
And Jeb!, who as governor used his own server against the rules and as Florida governor to discuss security and military issues such as troop deployments to the Middle East and the protection of nuclear plants.
2016 Republican candidates Scott Walker, Marco Rubio, Chris Christie, Rick Perry and Bobby Jindal each have their own email scandals. Mitt Romney too.
And of course there's all those Congressman who claim that they "don't use email", while having their aides use their private accounts to avoid FOIA requests, security be damned.
But no doubt you believe in IOKIYAR: It's OK If You're A Republican.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
Also pretty sure most people who comment here who lean toward the progressive or Democrat side are not actual fans of the Democratic party nor their politicians in actual practice. Conservative and Republican-leaning people here do not necessarily hew to the party, either. So you can go burn that strawman elsewhere.
You are the one who dragged partisan bs into this. Emanuel didn't have to learn it from anyone. They all do it, and have for ages. But it seems the ones who like to whine the loudest and most often about partisan politics are always the first to kick that dead horse it into the discussion.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
Trolls troll. Your missed, but only under your bridge.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re:
Troll loses with those who see the whole picture, troll wins with those who have tunnel vision.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Beside that, your the one making partisan claims, others are only refuting your 'I know it all' and 'no one else knows anything' position. Which is not only wrong, but absurd.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Oh, spare us.
But that wouldn't allow for an outraged renunciation and condemnation of a political opponents faux pa - a treasure beyond price it would seem.
Having said that, I no longer question if things will change. Decades of experience shows that when we think we see change, all we're really seeing is a change in how the bodies are hidden. The bodies are still there, still accumulating, still moldering in their make shift graves.
This is why some feel optimistic about PeOTUS Trump and his "drain the swamp" rhetoric. I would have cause to feel somewhat optimistic about a change finally occurring - if the incoming faces of his administration were not the same, shopworn feces we've already seen before, and thrown out of office before, with policies we've tried before and have seen fail before.
Not that it would be any different with any other candidate. Change is too disruptive and will not be allowed. Better the devils they know, than chance the evil of a possibly lost one red cent of profit pounded from the corpse of the people.
The people I would like to see elected are all too smart to wander into that mine field of hate, intolerance, parochialism, special interests and ignorance. I wouldn't run for office myself for all the tea in the world.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Transparency # Voluntary Disclosure
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
So you're saying another 5-10 years of court cases deciding which are covered as "subject to any applicable legal exemptions"
The more things change, the more they stay the same....
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Colin Powell
[ link to this | view in chronology ]