The American Civil Liberties Union notched a victory in its bid to obtain records on a 2017 U.S. military raid in Yemen when a federal judge ruled that the CIA could not refuse to acknowledge the existence of records given a White House press secretary’s remarks about the raid shortly after it was conducted. The ACLU had filed a Freedom of Information Act request for records of the raid that resulted in numerous civilian deaths including children. (Courthouse News Service, June 27, 2018, by Nick Rummell)
The ACLU submitted a letter to the judge in January, refuting the CIA’s arguments that cited James Madison Project v. DOJ which the CIA claimed backed their contention that a Glomar response was valid in the Yemen raid case. The letter said the ACLU’s request met the test established in James Madison in that the public acknowledgment of the incident supported the existence of records.