Am. Ctr. for Law & Justice v. DOJ, No. 16-2188, 2019 WL 2744684 (D.D.C. June 30, 2019) (Kelly, J.)

Am. Ctr. for Law & Justice v. DOJ, No. 16-2188, 2019 WL 2744684 (D.D.C. June 30, 2019) (Kelly, J.)

Re:  Request for records concerning June 2016 meeting between then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch and former President Bill Clinton that took place on airplane in Arizona

Disposition:  Granting defendant's renewed motion for summary judgment; denying plaintiff's renewed cross-motion for summary judgment

• Exemption 5, Deliberative Process Privilege:  "Upon consideration of the additional context provided by the Department in its renewed motion, the Court finds that the withheld attachment also falls within the ambit of the deliberative-process privilege and Exemption 5."  "The Department official represents that these talking points were prepared by Department staff for Attorney General Lynch in anticipation of her future interactions with the public and the press about her announcement that she was accepting the FBI's recommendation to close the investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton."  "And so, like the other sets of talking points withheld by the Department, the attachment constitutes a recommendation by subordinates to their superior advising her how to respond to inquiries."  "It is, in that respect, both predecisional and deliberative, reflecting a part of the give-and-take between the drafter and the Attorney General leading up to her external interactions."
   
• Litigation Considerations, "Reasonably Segregable" Requirements:  "In its prior opinion, the Court concluded that the Department's representation that it conducted a line-by-line review of each withheld document, along with its explanation that the 'factual content [contained in the withheld talking points and press statements] was generally intertwined with the advice being given and thus could not be segregated,' was enough to trigger a presumption in favor of the Department's compliance with FOIA's segregability requirement."  "The Department makes the same representations here, . . . and the Court therefore reaches the same conclusion . . . ."