NEW/THREAD: A forthcoming analysis from @TRACReports says @BuzzFeedNews has filed more #FOIA lawsuits--58-- than any other media organization in the US during Trump's presidency.

Here's a look back at the secrets my colleagues & I pried loose in 2020

1/

We started off 2020 publishing some of the most important and highly sought-after documents from former special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation: summaries of FBI interviews with key White House officials.
https://t.co/dfQI0LOa1I

2/
In February 2020, @BuzzFeedNews secured more than 1K pages of emails from NOAA related to Trump’s "doctored" map of Hurricane Dorian — dubbed #SharpieGate — and the panic, outrage, and internal revolt it triggered among top officials at those agencies.
https://t.co/G7tTRV9aqR

3/
That month, we also filed a #FOIA lawsuit against DOJ for docs related to Barr's intervention in the Flynn & Stone cases. Emails we obtained brought to light the behind-the-scenes drama between the lead prosecutor in the Stone case & his supervisor
 https://t.co/BdNFGpQiBf
4/
The federal response to #FOIA requests, which was already shitty, got worse during last year’s coronavirus outbreak. Some agencies used the pandemic to justify cutting off responses altogether and to abruptly halt the processing of FOIA requests.

But we fought back. We sued.

5/
In June 2020, we obtained documents that show the FDA authorized two malaria drugs boosted by Trump to treat COVID-19 was based on threadbare evidence.
https://t.co/q30B3ZZdDi
6/
We continued to chip away at the secrecy behind the government's response to #COVID19, and in May we received docs that reveal how deeply involved FEMA was in the govt's bungled response to the pandemic, despite the agency's denials.
https://t.co/ArgDyQcjYa
7/
When the country erupted in protest after a Minneapolis police officer killed George Floyd, the federal govt scrambled to respond, dispatching federal agents in a sweeping effort to police the demonstrations. @BuzzFeedNews swiftly filed FOIA requests and then sued the govt

8/
Last August, DHS turned over hundreds of pages of documents to @BuzzFeedNews that show how federal agents monitored #BlackLivesMatter protesters’ social media for intelligence and then braced for battle.
https://t.co/kuJtNxfh5t

9/
One of the Trump administration's most enduring controversies has been its immigration policies, which have resulted in dozens of deaths in detention facilities. To better understand what happened, BuzzFeed News sued DHS & ICE

10/
In Oct we published our findings, which included that a woman w/AIDS died after she was not given life-saving antiretroviral drugs & 3 detainees killed themselves even though they were supposed to have been under observation for mental health concerns
https://t.co/jg0UPvka9y
11/
Also last year, we used documents obtained through #FOIA lawsuits against the Treasury and Justice Departments to inform our groundbreaking #FinCENFiles investigation, published in September.
https://t.co/ETKey5nPDr

12/
Our #FOIA litigation rankled HSBC. A secret report we sought about failures in HSBC’s anti–money laundering efforts led the bank to take the unusual step of intervening in our lawsuit. It asked DOJ not to release it to us
https://t.co/usOchKPbx7

13/
The Mueller report, Russia’s election interference, and Ukrainian dealings that led to impeachment dominated much of Trump’s term in office; they also were targets of @BuzzFeedNews legal efforts

14/
Our #FOIA work generated headlines in March when Judge Reggie Walton, who was handling our/@EPICprivacy's lawsuit to unredact Mueller's report, issued a scathing opinion that questioned whether Barr intended to “create a one-sided narrative” about it
https://t.co/bVbWcQUnVW

15/
In June, DOJ was forced to remove vast swaths of black ink from the Mueller report in response to #FOIA lawsuits by @BuzzFeedNews and @EPICprivacy

The new details were revelatory

https://t.co/cwb10hOljS

16/
September brought another historic victory in Judge Walton’s court. He ordered the government to release, on the day before Election Day, even more redacted passages from the Mueller report, ruling that DOJ violated federal law 

17/
When those sections of the Mueller report were disclosed, it showed Mueller investigated Assange, WikiLeaks, and Stone related to the hacking of Democratic National Committee servers as well as for possible campaign finance violations.

https://t.co/x2e3tiJJTl

18/
The last set of docs we obtained in 2020 arrived in Dec. We had been fighting for its release for a year. It included 1 of the key historical docs of Trump’s presidency: the criminal referral sent to FBI & DOJ accusing Trump himself of breaking the law
https://t.co/6zSqSVrdx4
19/
Our battle against recalcitrant public officials required not only the work of our own lawyer, Chris Hickman (co author of our 2020 #FOIA wrap up) but also enlisting outside counsel, including attys @_LightLaw @mvtopic & @jloevy and @katie_rcfp & @Jen_A_Nelson

THANK YOU!

20/
And thank you to @ackocher and his team at @TRACReports for the data analysis!

More from Politics

Trump is gonna let the Mueller investigation end all on it's own. It's obvious. All the hysteria of the past 2 weeks about his supposed impending firing of Mueller was a distraction. He was never going to fire Mueller and he's not going to


Mueller's officially end his investigation all on his own and he's gonna say he found no evidence of Trump campaign/Russian collusion during the 2016 election.

Democrats & DNC Media are going to LITERALLY have nothing coherent to say in response to that.

Mueller's team was 100% partisan.

That's why it's brilliant. NOBODY will be able to claim this team of partisan Democrats didn't go the EXTRA 20 MILES looking for ANY evidence they could find of Trump campaign/Russian collusion during the 2016 election

They looked high.

They looked low.

They looked underneath every rock, behind every tree, into every bush.

And they found...NOTHING.

Those saying Mueller will file obstruction charges against Trump: laughable.

What documents did Trump tell the Mueller team it couldn't have? What witnesses were withheld and never interviewed?

THERE WEREN'T ANY.

Mueller got full 100% cooperation as the record will show.
This is partly what makes it impossible to have a constructive conversation nowadays. The stubborn refusal to accept that opposition to Trumpism and GOP nationalism is about more than simply holding different beliefs about things in and of itself. 👇


It's fine for people to hold different beliefs. But that doesn't mean all beliefs deserve equal treatment or tolerance and it doesn't mean intolerance of some beliefs makes a person intolerant of every belief which they don't share.

So if I said I don't think Trumpism deserves to be tolerated because it's just a fresh 21st century coat of cheap paint on a failed, dangerous 20th century ideology (fascism) that doesn't mean I'm intolerant of all beliefs with which I disagree. You'd think this would be obvious.

Another important facet. People who support fascist movements tend to give what they think are valid reasons for supporting them. That doesn't mean anyone is obliged to tolerate fascism or accept their proffered excuse.


Say you joined a neighborhood group that sets up community gardens and does roadside beautification projects. All good, right? Say one day you're having a meeting and you notice the President and exec board of this group are saying some bizarre things about certain neighbors.

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**Thread on Bravery of Sikhs**
(I am forced to do this due to continuous hounding of Sikh Extremists since yesterday)

Rani Jindan Kaur, wife of Maharaja Ranjit Singh had illegitimate relations with Lal Singh (PM of Ranjit Singh). Along with Lal Singh, she attacked Jammu, burnt - https://t.co/EfjAq59AyI


Hindu villages of Jasrota, caused rebellion in Jammu, attacked Kishtwar.

Ancestors of Raja Ranjit Singh, The Sansi Tribe used to give daughters as concubines to Jahangir.


The Ludhiana Political Agency (Later NW Fronties Prov) was formed by less than 4000 British soldiers who advanced from Delhi and reached Ludhiana, receiving submissions of all sikh chiefs along the way. The submission of the troops of Raja of Lahore (Ranjit Singh) at Ambala.

Dabistan a contemporary book on Sikh History tells us that Guru Hargobind broke Naina devi Idol Same source describes Guru Hargobind serving a eunuch
YarKhan. (ref was proudly shared by a sikh on twitter)
Gobind Singh followed Bahadur Shah to Deccan to fight for him.


In Zafarnama, Guru Gobind Singh states that the reason he was in conflict with the Hill Rajas was that while they were worshiping idols, while he was an idol-breaker.

And idiot Hindus place him along Maharana, Prithviraj and Shivaji as saviours of Dharma.
Tip from the Monkey
Pangolins, September 2019 and PLA are the key to this mystery
Stay Tuned!


1. Yang


2. A jacobin capuchin dangling a flagellin pangolin on a javelin while playing a mandolin and strangling a mannequin on a paladin's palanquin, said Saladin
More to come tomorrow!


3. Yigang Tong
https://t.co/CYtqYorhzH
Archived: https://t.co/ncz5ruwE2W


4. YT Interview
Some bats & pangolins carry viruses related with SARS-CoV-2, found in SE Asia and in Yunnan, & the pangolins carrying SARS-CoV-2 related viruses were smuggled from SE Asia, so there is a possibility that SARS-CoV-2 were coming from