Tinubu FOIA Case: US Firm Rejects Presidency’s Account, Plans Court Intervention
A United States-based political advisory and lobbying firm, Von Batten-Montague-York, has challenged the Nigerian Presidency’s account of an ongoing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) case involving records relating to President Bola Tinubu before a US federal court.
The firm accused the Presidency of presenting a misleading account of the proceedings and said it was preparing to seek permission to intervene in the case before the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.
Von Batten-Montague-York made the position known in a statement posted on its verified X account on Friday, one day after the Nigerian Presidency released its own explanation of the litigation.
The dispute centres on renewed attention to a FOIA lawsuit seeking records held by US government agencies concerning Tinubu.
In its statement on Thursday, the Presidency, through the Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, described the matter as a civil case concerning access to government records and not a criminal proceeding against the Nigerian president.
Onanuga said the case, identified as Civil Action No. 23-1816, began after Aaron Greenspan submitted FOIA requests in 2022 to several US government agencies seeking records connected to Tinubu.
The Presidency explained that while some agencies withheld records, others refused to confirm or deny whether relevant records existed. Greenspan subsequently filed the case before the federal court in Washington, D.C., in 2023.
According to the Presidency, Tinubu was later permitted to participate in the proceedings as an intervenor.
The Presidency also said several US agencies invoked the “Glomar defence”, a legal mechanism that allows government agencies to decline to confirm or deny the existence of investigative records where doing so could compromise protected interests.
It further stated that the court later entered summary judgment in favour of the CIA, the Executive Office for United States Attorneys, the Department of State, the Department of the Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service, thereby removing those agencies from the proceedings.
However, Von Batten-Montague-York rejected that characterisation of the FOIA litigation and accused the administration of attempting to “mislead the world”.
The firm told the public that it had notified Greenspan, the US Department of Justice and Tinubu’s lawyers of its intention to ask the court for permission to file an amicus curiae brief addressing the president’s claimed privacy interests.
Von Batten-Montague-York said its proposed intervention would examine whether Tinubu’s privacy claim should receive the same level of protection after the Nigerian Presidency publicly discussed the litigation and the records involved.
The firm argued that the Presidency’s decision to speak publicly about the records could weaken the basis for the privacy protection being claimed before the US court under Exemption 7(C) of the FOIA.
Also Read: FOIA: Tinubu Joins Push to Delay Release of US Records, But Judge Rejects 10-Day Extension
More controversially, the firm alleged that the records at the centre of the dispute concern what it described as “alleged heroin trafficking records”. It also accused the Presidency of making what it called “obvious untruths” concerning FBI, DEA and court records.
“You cannot claim privacy before the Court and then blatantly misrepresent the records to the public,” the firm said.
“That might work in Nigeria; it does not work in the United States,” it added.
