Empire State Building U.S. Department of Justice FOIA Ruling Malkin Holdings

https://www.justice.gov/oip/edelman-v-sec-no-14-1140-2017-wl-908473-ddc-mar-6-2017-moss-j
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• Exemption 6: "Given the fact-intensive nature of the required inquiry, the Court cannot accept the SEC's invitation to sustain its application of Exemption 6 to all identifying information about all of the complainants." The court finds that "because the current record lacks sufficient information for the Court to conduct the required balancing, and because the SEC (which mistakenly concluded that providing the complainants' names 'would not shed light on how the government operates,' . . . should conduct the relevant balancing in the first instance, the Court will deny summary judgment at this time." The court relates that, "[a]ccording to the SEC, releasing this information 'would not shed light on how the government operates,' and, thus, the complainants' privacy interest necessarily outweighs the public interest." The court finds "that the SEC has not correctly performed the required balancing." The court finds that defendant's "conclusion ignores the 'public interest in knowing who may be exerting influence on [SEC] officials sufficient to convince them to' approve or disapprove a transaction[,]" "the public interest in knowing whether the SEC gives 'greater weight to the comments submitted by' some complainants than others[,]" and "the public interest in understanding whether particular complaints, which were credited or rejected by the SEC, were based on personal knowledge, financial interests, or other factors."