Officials from Fox Business are suing the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, complaining about the Fed’s failure to comply with the network’s data requests filed under the Freedom of Information Act.
The network filed a FOIA request on November 10, 2008 to find out what financial institutions were receiving funds from the Fed between August 2007 and November 2008. Another FOIA request was made on November 18 for a list of financial institutions who were lent money between September and October 2008.
Neither one has been answered.
Fox News Executive Vice President Kevin Magee said in a statement, “As a news organization, we believe in the public's right to know and will continue in our quest to hold the government accountable for their actions on the allocation of the bailout funds.”
Steven Mintz, Esq., of Mintz & Gold LLP, and legal counsel for the network added, "The government has power over possibly trillions of the taxpayer's money and the fact that they are denying requests for enhanced transparency on the distribution of those funds is appalling. Therefore, we have filed a complaint in federal court in New York and ask the Court to make the Fed provide the information sought by the journalists at FBN."