Communications between the CDC and Montefiore Medical Center (National Institutes of Health)

To Whom It May Concern:

Pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act, I hereby request the following records:

A) All emails sent between January 1, 2020 and August 5, 2021 by officials of your agency/ institute to any Montefiore Leadership containing the following keywords (case insensitive): "vaccine" | "vaccines" | "vaccinate" | "vaccination" | "vaccinated" | "vaccinations" | "vax" | "vaxxed"
B) All emails sent between January 1, 2020 and August 5, 2021 by officials of your agency/ institute to any Montefiore Leadership containing the following keywords (case insensitive): "moderna" | "modernatx" | "pfizer" | "astrazeneca" | "johnson & johnson" | "j&j" | "jnj" | "biontech"
C) All emails sent between January 1, 2020 and August 5, 2021 by officials of your agency/ institute to any Montefiore Leadership containing the following keywords (case insensitive): "powell"
D) All emails sent between January 1, 2020 and August 5, 2021 by Anthony Fauci (Director of NIAID) to any Montefiore Leadership
E) All emails sent between January 1, 2020 and August 5, 2021 by Anthony Fauci (Director of NIAID) to an AECOM or MMC email address (i.e. email addresses containing the following in their domains: "einsteinmed.org" | "einstein.yu.edu" | "montefiore.org")
F) All emails sent between January 1, 2020 and August 5, 2021 by officials of your agency/ institute to Gordon Tomaselli (Chief Academic Officer at Montefiore Medicine)
G) All emails sent between January 1, 2020 and August 5, 2021 by officials of your agency/ institute to Harris Goldstein (Associate Dean for Scientific Resources at AECOM)

DEFINITIONS:
* "Montefiore Leadership" includes Philip O. Ozuah (CEO), Colleen M. Blye (CFO), Gordon Tomaselli (CAO), Susan Green-Lorenzen (COO), Christopher S. Panczner (CLO), Andrew D. Racine (CMO), Sarah Berlenbach, Rick Chandler, Marcos A. Crespo, Joseph D'Amico (CSO), Kathleen Kearns (CPO), Gloria Kenny (CHRO), Edward Pfleging, Stephen Rosenthal, Peter P. Semczuk, Joe Somonese, Jack Wolf, Harris Goldstein, Rick Kitsis and Thomas Rohan. For clarification, many of their profiles are listed on Montefiore Medical Center's website here: https://www.montefiore.org/about-leadership
* "MMC" refers to Montefiore Medical Center, Montefiore Health System and its subsidiaries. For clarification, their website is https://www.montefiore.org/
* "AECOM" refers to Albert Einstein College of Medicine. For clarification, their website is https://einsteinmed.org/

GUIDELINES:
* Include all attachments and images attached after the body of the email containing the attachment
* Include the names of all To/CC/BCC
* Return each lettered request above in separate electronic documents
* Organize each document first by name of sender, then by date sent from earliest to latest (e.g. all emails from "Jane Doe" in date order followed by all emails from "John Smith" in date order and so on)

The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes.

In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 20 business days, as the statute requires.

Sincerely,

Indigo

Good morning,

This is a formal appeal of the finding of no responsive documents for requests A, B, C, F & G. I have a few questions about how the search was conducted. Below these questions you will find the reasons for believing there are responsive documents.

PROCESS QUESTIONS:
1. When checking for communications between NIMH officials and Montefiore Leadership, were all emails in NIMH's possession searched?
2. What level of staff were considered as "officials" in your search?
3. How many "officials" were searched?
4. How did your office search for Montefiore Leadership email recipients?

REASONS FOR BELIEF OF THE EXISTENCE RESPONSIVE RECORDS (organized by original lettered request):
A/B) Montefiore works closely with the NIH and received record funding in 2020 (according to an article published by Montefiore here: http://stage-now.montefiore.org/montefiore-einstein-shatters-their-nih-funding-record-awards-total-more-223-million-in-2020) for research in various fields, many of which involve vaccination (http://stage-now.montefiore.org/montefiore-einstein-forefront-of-important-clinical-trials-including-vaccine-covid-19 | https://www.montefiore.org/body.cfm?id=1738&action=detail&ref=1852). Terms related to vaccination and vaccine development as requested originally would be expected between Montefiore Leadership and the NIH.
C) Your office's final response letter indicates that "powell" was searched for as an email recipient rather than as a keyword to be searched for within emails. This is incorrect. The original response indicates that "powell" is a keyword, not a person.
F) Gordon Tomaselli (as is stated in his public bio here: https://www.einsteinmed.org/leadership/) has a lab that has been continually funded by NIH for 25 years. Communications between him and anyone at NIH are expected to exist even for mere logistical purposes. For clarity, I am requesting *all* emails sent to Gordon Tomaselli, not just emails with a specific keyword.
G) Harris Goldstein (as is stated in his public bio here: https://einsteinmed.org/faculty/4281/harris-goldstein/) has an NIH-funded lab in the high-priority field of HIV research. Communications between him and anyone at NIH are expected to exist even for mere logistical purposes. For clarity, I am requesting *all* emails sent to Harris Goldstein, not just emails with a specific keyword.

For additional clarity, your final response letter indicated that I may have been searching for emails sent to all Montefiore Leadership and other named officials at once (as in a group email with all Montefiore Leadership To/CC/BCC), whereas I am requesting (wherever "Montefiore Leadership" or named individual is mentioned) *any* communications sent to *any* of the individuals in Montefiore Leadership, even if they are the only recipient individually. (E.g. I want all emails with keyword "powell" sent from an official of NIH to Philip O. Ozuah and so on.)

Thank you for your help,
Indigo

To Whom It May Concern:

I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information Act request, copied below, and originally submitted on August 6, 2021 and appealed on September 2, 2021. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response.

Thanks for your help, and let me know if further clarification is needed.

Hello,

Thank you for following up and keeping track of my appeal request. Attached is a text copy of the appeal and original letter.

Thank you for your help,
Indigo