It’s Sunshine Week, the annual celebration of access to public information, coordinated by the Joseph L. Brechner Freedom of Information Project. To commemorate the power of public information, we’ve asked experts to share their tips for requesting open records and responding when facing roadblocks to access.
Nate Jones, AKA “FOIA Nate,” is FOIA director at The Washington Post, where he works daily with journalists to obtain public records on the local, state, and federal levels. He helps reporters think strategically about which documents they should request and when to appeal or sue for access. Jones is also the author of the Post’s “Revealing Records” column and has conducted several investigations based on responses to public records requests.
We asked him to reflect on the current state of FOIA and to share some tips for making more efficient public records requests.
What are some of the biggest open access issues you are hearing from journalists or experiencing yourself in 2025?
Jones: Pretty much the same as when I started using FOIA almost 20 years ago: delays and over-redactions. … Gutting FOIA offices will only make response times at those agencies slower. But it’s also clear that most of the FOIA shops at the largest federal agencies have been woefully inefficient — as well as underfunded — at processing FOIA requests for a long time.
How can you narrow a request without losing the scope of what you’re trying to get?
Jones: To start, never file a “fishing expedition” request. Do your front-end reporting by reading documents and talking to people to find out what records actually exist. Then file.
Always request records, not “information.” Describe the record as specifically as possible including date created, title, and custodian of the records so that agency officials can find it as easily as possible.
If the agency asks to narrow after you’ve filed a well-crafted request, get on the phone with an official and ask them to describe the responsive or potentially responsive records and request only what you are really interested in. See if you can “horse trade” to get an earlier estimated date of completion for your records in exchange for narrowing the request.
What advice do you have for keeping FOIA request costs reasonable for journalists?
Jones: At the federal level, one of the biggest impacts from the 2016 FOIA amendments was the provision stating that news media does not have to pay most FOIA fees if the agency misses its time limit to possess the FOIA. Study up on 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(4)(A)(viii)(I) and mention it in your request letters.
Tags: Sunshine Week