FOIA Appeal, Adequacy of the Search, Denied
Office of Hearings and Appeals
March 12, 2024
minute read time
On March 12, 2024, the Office of Hearings and Appeals (OHA) denied the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Appeal filed by Dustin Slaughter (Appellant) from a determination letter issued by the Department of Energy's Office of Public Information (OPI). In the determination letter, OPI stated that a search was conducted, but no responsive records were found. On appeal, the Appellant challenged the adequacy of the search. After consideration, we found that OPI FOIA staff appropriately relied on the relevant subject matter experts (SMEs) at the DOE's Office of Public Affairs (PA) and Office of the Assistant Secretary for Congressional & Intergovernmental Affairs (CI) to determine where responsive documents were most likely to be located. OPI first conducted an initial search within the relevant email accounts in CI, but the search terms used were too broad and produced wholly unrelated results. OPI then ran a narrower search using terms that were reasonably calculated to uncover any records that would be responsive to the Appellant's FOIA request, but that returned no results. OPI additionally ran two separate searches that also used appropriate search terms, but no responsive documents were found. Therefore, a reasonable search was conducted, and we deny the appeal. (OHA Case No. FIA-24-0015)