Editorial – It’s the law: Public records are public

The kerfuffle over the email policy of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton continues to fester. Critics call her use of a private server for official business a contemptuous slap against transparency, while defenders say she is not alone in shielding business-related emails from the public.

#Indeed, the website Politico noted in a recent story that the Freedom of Information Act doesn’t apply to Congress, which means emails by Sens. Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Marco Rubio — Republicans who are possible presidential candidates, as is Democrat Clinton — are likely to remain closed to public scrutiny.

#To which we say: The terms of this debate are all wrong. The onus shouldn’t be on the public to prove why their elected officials’ correspondence should be open to scrutiny; it should be on the officials to prove why their emails should be off-limits in the first place. Continue>>>
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