DHS Communications with Peter King
| Submitted | April 7, 2011 |
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Communications
From: Philip Halin
To Whom It May Concern:
This is a request under the Freedom of Information Act. I hereby request the following records:
All records of communication between your agency and the office of Congressman Peter King including but not limited to emails, letters or other communication to and from Congressman Peter King or any member of his staff. In addition, I request the results of a keyword search of the aforementioned communications for the keywords "islam", “terrorist”, “muslim”, or “jihad”.
I also request that, if appropriate, fees be waived as I believe this request is in the public interest. The requested documents will be made available to the general public free of charge as part of the public information service at MuckRock.com, processed by a representative of the news media/press and is made in the process of news gathering and not for commercial usage.
In the event that fees cannot be waived, 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,
Philip Halin
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From: Department of Homeland Security
Dear Mr. Halin,
On April 7, 2011, you submitted a FOIA request to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for all communication between our agency and the office of Congressman Peter King including but not limited to emails, letters or other communication to and from Congressman Peter King or any members of his staff. In addition, you requested the results of keyword search of the aforementioned communications for the keywords, “Islam”, “terrorist”, Muslim” or “jihad”.
We require some additional information from you in order to process the FOIA request further as it relates to the first portion of the request that states “all records or communication between your agency and the office of Congressman Peter King including but not limited to emails, letters or other communication to and from Congressman Peter King or any member of his staff.” The DHS FOIA office tasked the appropriate office for a search of records responsive to your request. That office is asking that you clarify portions of your request so an appropriate search can be conducted. Please keep in mind that DHS was created in 2003, so there will be no records prior to March, 2003.
A suggested way to narrow the scope is to request the “Congressional log” for Peter King from within the Executive Correspondence Tracking Management System (ECT). ECT tracks incoming and outgoing correspondence between DHS headquarters and members of Congress. From within the log, a search for terms such as the ones you provided could be completed. Additionally, you may use the log to request records from certain workflows for future FOIA requests. If you agree to accept this Congressional log for Peter King, then the only additional information we would need is a specific time frame for the search.
Otherwise, we will need additional information such as the following:
· Names of senior DHS headquarters officials whose records we should search
· Specific timeframe that these records would have been created.
· If you require a search of DHS components other than the DHS Executive Secretariat, please provide the names of senior DHS officials whose records we should search and the timeframes that the records would have been created. (see http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/DHS_OrgChart.pdf, http://www.dhs.gov/xabout/structure/).
Please provide this information as soon as possible so that we may continue processing your request. If you have questions, you may contact this office at 703-235-0790.
Regards,
DHS Privacy Office
Disclosure & FOIA Program
STOP 0655
Department of Homeland Security
245 Murray Lane, SW
Arlington, VA 20598-0655
Telephone: 1-866-431-0486 or 703-235-0790
Fax: 703-235-0443
Visit our FOIA website
From: Department of Homeland Security
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