HARTFORD, Conn. (Legal Newsline) - Connecticut Attorney General William Tong lost his attempt to squelch an open-records request for information about coordination with other state AGs on climate litigation after a state court judge ruled against his office’s arguments for dismissal.
Environmental Policy Advocates is fighting the Connecticut Freedom of Information Commission’s decision to reverse itself earlier this year and reject two requests for access to emails between AG’s office personnel and employees of other states. AG Tong’s office argued EPA was prohibited from appealing both of the denials in a single action and asked a state court judge to dismiss one of the appeals outright.
Judge John L. Cordani rejected the AG’s reasoning, however, saying Connecticut heard arguments about the FOIA requests on the same day, combined them for administrative purposes and issued the denials in the same proceeding. Transcripts make it clear “the two matters were formally consolidated for all purposes,” the judge wrote in a in a Dec. 20 order denying the state’s request.
“The Freedom of Information Commission was in control of the procedure and process employed in the administrative proceeding below and apparently allowed and even encouraged this confusion of the record and the de facto consolidation of these matters,” the judge wrote.
Dismissing one of the two FOIA request appeals “will likely have serious substantive consequences,” the judge wrote, since it would likely mean EPA could never again obtain judicial review of the denial.
Tong defends his office’s secrecy, saying its communications are protected under what the common interest doctrine, which shields information attorneys share among themselves to prepare for litigation involving the same basic facts. EPA argues the Connecticut AG, like AGs in other states, is trying to prevent public oversight of purely political discussions about how to target an unpopular industry and generate revenue for their states without explicitly raising taxes.