September 25, 2007

Contact: Naomi Seligman Steiner 202.408.5565 nseligman@citizensforethics.org

25 Sep 2007 // Today, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed a lawsuit against the Executive Office of the President, the Office of Administration and the National Archives and Records Administration challenging as contrary to law their knowing failure to recover, restore and preserve millions of electronic communications created and/or received within the White House.

The lawsuit stems from the millions of e-mails that were improperly deleted from White House servers and currently exist on back-up tapes, if at all.

CREW's suit follows a similar suit filed a few weeks ago by the National Security Archives. In addition, CREW sent a letter to Alan Swendiman, director of the Office of Administration (OA), seeking immediate written assurances that the OA has taken, and will continue to take, all steps necessary to preserve the back-up tapes, which at this point are all that is left of the large volume of historically important documents deleted from the servers.