Thread: Trump's White House will keep its guest book secret

APRIL 14, 2017, 10:50 A.M.
REPORTING FROM WASHINGTON

Trump's White House will keep its guest book secret

Brian Bennett

(Evan Vucci / Associated Press)

The Trump administration will keep the records of who visits the White House secret, ending a practice started under the Obama administration of partially releasing visitor logs, a White House official said Friday.

Even though President Trump led chants of “drain the swamp” during the campaign and promised to protect government business from special interests, the decision makes it harder for the public to know who is influencing the president and his close advisors.

Keeping the visitor logs hidden from public view will protect the privacy of visitors and is meant to address security risks that may be posed if people are identified publicly as close to Trump, White House communications director Mike Dubke said Friday.

The public and the media will be able to file requests for the logs under the Freedom of Information Act, Dubke said. Such requests often require legal action that can delay the release of records for several years.

"Given the grave national security risks and privacy concerns of the hundreds of thousands of visitors annually, the White House Office will disclose Secret Service logs as outlined under the Freedom of Information Act, a position the Obama White House successfully defended in federal court,” Dubke said in a statement.

The Secret Service conducts background checks and keeps a list of all visitors to the 18-acre White House grounds.

The Obama administration voluntarily released some visitor records, but often omitted the names of visitors that Obama’s aides considered sensitive, such as candidates for judicial posts and personal contacts, including celebrities and some Obama campaign donors.

http://www.latimes.com/politics/wash...htmlstory.html

Obama also omitted his radical friends.

Originally Posted by posylady

Obama also omitted his radical friends.

Yes, but that is no excuse for Trump to do the same thing (or worse) IMO, this just makes it easier for the "gators" in the swamp to keep feeding aggressively without concerning themselves with what the voters think. I understand there are some things in government that can't be revealed for national security reasons, but I don't see how a public list of those visiting the White House involves national security. Government transparency to the maximum extend possible is good policy in my view. Nobody wants to think our government is actively hiding their actions.

I always thought it was stupid to reveal the visitors log to the White House.

"Given the grave national security risks and privacy concerns of the hundreds of thousands of visitors annually, the White House Office will disclose Secret Service logs as outlined under the Freedom of Information Act, a position the Obama White House successfully defended in federal court,” Dubke said in a statement.

Conservative and liberal watchdogs slam Trump for refusing to release White House visitor logs

BRYAN LOGAN
Apr 15th 2017 12:58PM

News of the Trump administration's move to keep White House visitor logs secret has prompted criticism from conservative and liberal groups. The administration cited "grave national-security risks and privacy concerns" on Friday as reasons to keep the logs under wraps.

Tom Fitton, president of the conservative-leaning watchdog Judicial Watch, said the organization was "disappointed" with the White House's decision. "Unfortunately, this move is perfectly in line with the policy of the Obama White House to prevent these visitors logs from being processed and released under the Freedom of Information Act," Fitton's statement read.

"This new secrecy policy undermines the rule of law and suggests this White House doesn't want to be accountable to the American people," Fitton said.

The liberal-leaning American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said in its own statement: "Elected officials work for the people and we deserve to see government business conducted in transparent daylight."

The ACLU's statement continued:

"Trump has bullied the press when they report on him. He has promoted the reporting of fake and outright false information. He imposed gags on federal employees in the earliest days of his administration. He has avoided disclosing his tax records, and he has avoided releasing information about his conflicts of interest. The only reasonable conclusion is to believe the Trump administration has many things it is trying to hide."

The Trump White House logs will be kept under wraps until five years after President Donald Trump leaves office.

The Obama administration had fought to protect some portions of its own White House logs, or circumvent the need to use them, but ultimately released six million of the records.

https://www.aol.com/article/news/201...logs/22041183/

I like Judicial Watch, but disagree with them on this one. They would do the country a bigger favor to ask for the visitor's logs to federal judges offices.

Originally Posted by Judy

I like Judicial Watch, but disagree with them on this one. They would do the country a bigger favor to ask for the visitor's logs to federal judges offices.

That might be very revealing.

I can see how, in this atmosphere/at this time, there would be visitors who didn't want their names made public. I don't know exactly how I feel about it - maybe so and maybe no.

These are unusual times and circumstances -

Well, throughout history, no President made these logs public until Barack Obama, so going back to the better days and ways of the past may be due.

Originally Posted by Judy

Well, throughout history, no President made these logs public until Barack Obama, so going back to the better days and ways of the past may be due.

So you don't support government transparency? You can't "drain the swamp" if you don't know who the 'gators' are.

No, I'm not big on transparency. I think people, businesses and most government leaders and agencies require some privacy to function properly.