DOJ prosecutes single FOIA dodger while defending systemwide evasion

David Morens, a former NIH official, became the first person convicted of a felony for obstructing the Freedom of Information Act after admitting to deleting emails related to COVID-19's origins. However, critics argue the DOJ's aggressive prosecution of Morens is hypocritical, as it has treated similar FOIA violations by high-ranking officials like Hillary Clinton and Trump officials as civil matters rather than criminal ones, and that targeting individual officials won't fix the systemic problems plaguing FOIA compliance across the federal government.