According to new figures out this week from the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Information Policy, Freedom of Information Act requests have dramatically surged in the past year, along with denials, backlogs, delays and costs. 

The annual FOIA Report for fiscal year 2024, released April 28, indicates that federal agencies saw a 25% increase of requests, from 1.2 million in 2023 to 1.5 million in 2024. As well, backlogged requests increased 33%, from 200,843 to 267,056. That translated into longer response times for simple requests, from an average of 39 days to 44 days. 

Also, the percentage of requests that were fully granted continued to decline – an all-time low of 12%. Fully granted requests totaled 16% last year, and that has been steadily declining since a high of 38% in 2010. 

Most (61%) of the government’s requests are focused on the Department of Homeland Security. 

Along with a surge in requests and denials has come an increase in administrative appeals – at 20,115, up 39% from 14,443 in 2023, with half of those appeals going to DHS.  

Also, with increased activity came increased costs. Federal agencies employed 5,638 full-time FOIA staff in FY 2024, up from 4,944 in 2023. Estimated cost of FOIA was at $723 million for processing requests (up 22%), and $54 million for defending FOIA lawsuits (up 10%). 

Those numbers have likely dropped since the Department of Government Efficiency purge and buyouts. 

As is typical with the annual FOIA reports, little context is by OIP. We called and talked with Lindsay Steel, chief of the OIP compliance office, and while she couldn’t comment on specific causes of the increase, she said her office was surprised by the data. 

“The increase really was unprecedented,” Steel said. 

Absolutely. We have yet to see such dramatic year-to-year change in tracking FOIA data since 2010.  

Further examination of FOIA logs might shed light on the cause of the increases. Some agencies have reported use of automated requests increasing activity, particularly by partisan organizations like the Heritage Foundation. Also, FOIA.gov enables people to easily submit requests, which could have led to more activity. 

Regardless, congressional action is necessary to fix the system, including more resources, better technology, streamlined enforcement mechanisms, and increased education and training for government workers and requesters. 

It will be interesting to see what next year’s report looks like, given the staff cuts in FOIA offices, and even at OIP (director Bobby Talebian was fired March 7 as part of the DOGE cuts). With less staff and more requests, backlogs and delays are likely to balloon even more, leaving Americans in the dark. 

Posted: April 30, 2025
Category: Brechner News
Tagged as: Brechner FOI Project, Brechner Freedom of Information Project, open records laws, Secrecy Tracker