(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it and the Daily Caller News Foundation (DCNF) received from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) 311 pages of records of heavily redacted communications from Dr. Anthony Fauci and the World Health Organization (WHO) regarding COVID-19.
Certain Fauci emails were redacted, including his personal edits to a COVID-related federal appropriations measure. Emails sent from the WHO were also redacted under a trade secrets exemption.
In a letter with the documents, HHS Freedom of Information Act Officer Gorka Garcia-Malene notes that:
[FOIA] Exemption 4 protects from disclosure trade secrets and commercial or financial information that is privileged and confidential. Exemption 5 [under which the Fauci email is redacted] permits the withholding of internal government records which are predecisional and contain staff advice, opinion, and recommendations. Read more from Judicial Watch.