By Tim Gamble
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, America First Legal (AFL) secured a critical preliminary injunction in its lawsuit against the Biden-Harris Administration for its policies that routinely result in the illegal destruction of Centers for Disease and Prevention (CDC) employee emails in violation of the Federal Records Act. The injunction requires the CDC to stop illegally deleting employee emails and requires Attorney General Merrick Garland to work with the National Archivist to recover the illegally deleted emails and make the CDC comply with the law.
On February 3, 2023, AFL requested records regarding the CDC’s support for teacher-led indoctrination of children with radical gender ideology. Subsequently, the CDC told AFL that the CDC routinely deletes the emails of nearly all of its employees thirty days after they leave the agency.
AFL then sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Inspector General and the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) requesting an investigation of the CDC’s unlawful policy of deleting employee emails. NARA investigated the allegations but determined that because the “CDC instructs individual email account holders to apply retention based on the email’s content value and its applicability to a NARA-approved records schedule,” NARA considered the matter closed. In short, NARA entrusted individual CDC employees to decide which emails can be automatically deleted.
In light of this egregious position and the CDC’s illegal conduct, on April 17, 2024, AFL sued the Biden-Harris Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and NARA under the Federal Records Act for allowing the unlawful deletion of former CDC employees’ emails after they leave the agency.
Today, the Court granted AFL’s motion, ordering that the CDC is enjoined from deleting or destroying former non-Capstone employees’ emails until the time periods established in GRS 6.1 (i.e., at least three years for the most junior employees) have passed or pending further order of the Court upon the Archivist’s approval of an alternate disposal schedule.
Additionally, NARA must now seek assistance from Attorney General Merrick Garland (and notify Congress of that action) to recover illegally deleted records, force the CDC to comply with the law, and stop its illegal practice of destroying federal records.
Every legislator must now be on notice about the Biden Administration’s politicization of records management.
Notably, while the Biden-Harris administration has been slapped down for illegally violating the law, CDC employees’ homes were not searched and raided without notice or consent, nor have their families had to endure the trauma and onslaught of legal fees or indictments.
Yet, the Biden-Harris Administration did exactly that to President Trump. We cannot have a country where government bureaucrats are allowed to circumvent the law without repercussion, and innocent civilians are subjected to invasive and unlawful political persecution for saying the “wrong” thing. The two-tiered justice system in the United States has never been more prevalent.
Statement from Gene Hamilton, America First Legal Executive Director:
“The Biden-Harris Administration was actively destroying the records of federal employees at the CDC in blatant violation of the law–and we are pleased that the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has ordered a stop to their illegal conduct. The Department of Justice has rightfully been ordered to assist with retrieving these records and putting an end to these illegal practices. The Biden-Harris Administration’s politicization of records management must end, and we look forward to holding them accountable for their illegal actions in all such circumstances,“ said Gene Hamilton.
Read the documents here.
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