The withdrawal of previously declassified U.S. federal records is a process in which agencies can remove records from public access that they believe were incorrectly

declassified Declassification is the process of ceasing a protective classification, often under the principle of freedom of information. Procedures for declassification vary by country. Papers may be withheld without being classified as secret, and event ...

and made available to the public at the

National Archives and Records Administration The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an " independent federal agency of the United States government within the executive branch", charged with the preservation and documentation of government and historical records. It i ...

. The process is often referred to as "reclassification," but because the records were never properly declassified and remained classified even when made publicly available, they are not ''re''-classified.

History

In 1995,

President Clinton William Jefferson Clinton ( né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He previously served as governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and again ...

signed Executive Order 12958 which directed agencies to declassify all records that were twenty-five years or older by the end of 1999, with certain exemptions for information that remained sensitive. Security concerns over

restricted data Restricted Data (RD) is a category of proscribed information, per National Industrial Security Program Operating Manual (NISPOM). Specifically, it is defined by the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 as: :''all data concerning (1) design, manufacture, or u ...

were heightened in 1999 by the

Wen Ho Lee Wen Ho Lee or Li Wenho (; born December 21, 1939) is a Taiwanese-American scientist who worked for the University of California at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. He created simulations of nuclear explosions for the purposes of ...

case, in which a Taiwanese American nuclear weapons engineer was accused of selling secrets to the

People’s Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

. Additionally, the State Department was accused by the Department of Energy of improperly releasing information it was not authorized to declassify. In 1999, declassification efforts slowed considerably with the passage of the Kyl-Lott Amendment to the 1999 Defense Authorization Act which requires that all declassified records be reviewed for restricted data (RD) and formerly restricted data (FRD). The Kyl-Lott Amendment led to the removal of previously declassified records from public access for re-review of restricted data. During the George W. Bush administration, the signing of Executive Order 13292 in 2003 eased the process of withdrawals and further delayed automatic declassification review. The process was further codified in 2009 by the signing of

Executive Order 13526 Executive Order 13526 was issued on December 29, 2009, by United States President Barack Obama.

and 32 C.F.R. Part 2001.13. The process of removing previously declassified records was itself covert until it was revealed by the

National Security Archive The National Security Archive is a 501(c)(3) non-governmental, non-profit research and archival institution located on the campus of the George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Founded in 1985 to check rising government secrecy. The Nat ...

in February 2006. Following outcry by journalists, historians, and the public, an internal audit by the National Archive’s

Information Security Oversight Office The Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO) is responsible to the President for policy and oversight of the government-wide security classification system and the National Industrial Security Program in the United States. The ISOO is a comp ...

indicated that more than one third of the records withdrawn since 1999, did not contain sensitive information. In response, the National Archives has made annual reports of records withdrawn from public access.

Withdrawals of Previously Declassified Records since 2006

Notes

Reference

{{reflist

External links

Declassification in ReverseSecret Agreement Reveals Covert Program to Hide Reclassification from PublicThe Great Bush Reclassification ProjectHow Many and Where Were the Nukes?ISOO Audit Report Exposes Abuse of Classification System
National Archives and Records Administration United States government secrecy Freedom of Information Act (United States) Classified information in the United States

History

Withdrawals of Previously Declassified Records since 2006

Notes

Reference

See also

External links