If you are long enough of tooth to remember the Pentagon Papers and Watergate, you recall the level of courage required to stand up against the corrosive tactic of government keeping secrets from its citizens. Ellsberg and The New York Times, Woodward, Bernstein and The Washington Post, all are names in the pantheon of transparency.
Opinion
When politicians in government conceal their actions from the public, it is the citizenry and the free press that must hold their feet to the fire in order to reveal the truth. That’s what the founders had in mind when they designed our open political system. They were adamant in their writings that an informed citizenry is crucial to a functioning republic.
That axiom is being tested in Wyoming where Secretary of State Chuck Gray is refusing to disclose the legal advice he received from the attorney general, advice that Gray claims justifies the release of sensitive voter information contrary to state law. Cheyenne attorney George Powers has filed a complaint against Gray, and Gray continues to stonewall, citing attorney-client privilege.
The attorney-client privilege belongs to Secretary Gray. It is his alone to waive.
Absent a court order or a waiver of privilege by Secretary Gray, the attorney general will never disclose an attorney-client communication. That is what attorneys are required to do. They keep secrets on behalf of their clients.
The secretary, on the other hand, can waive the privilege any time he wants.
Let’s say that another way. The only reason no one has disclosed the advice the attorney general gave to Secretary Gray is because Secretary Gray wants that advice secret.
What Secretary Gray is doing is saying, “In consultation with the Attorney General” I disclosed the personal information of every voter in Wyoming to the federal government.
By his actions, he says, “I’’m not going to tell you what the legal reason I turned over your highly personal information to departments of the government not bound by confidentiality laws like the IRS, because I don’t have to. Nanny nanny boo boo.”
Instead of addressing the issue, Secretary Gray says the complaints against him releasing personal information on thousands of people are “more lunacy and lawfare from a radical leftwing attorney George Powers who has Trump Derangement Syndrome and whose false claims with zero substantiation are being repeated by the leftwing media in a coordinated attack on the truth.”
Apparently, people who are concerned about their personal information being disclosed deserve to be called names, and those who report on the issue need to be derided.
The U.S. Supreme Court’s decisions in both the Pentagon Papers and Watergate cases paint a very different picture. In both decisions, the highest court in the land sided squarely with the people’s right to know what government is doing on their behalf. No ifs, ands, or buts; government transparency is the law of the land.
For Gray to claim otherwise flies in the face of legal precedent and makes him look like he has a secret to hide from the citizens.
As card-carrying members of the free press — one of the flames held to the feet of secretive politicians — we applaud Powers’ crusade for sunlight in Wyoming government. And we call upon Secretary Gray to waive privilege and reveal to his fellow citizens the reasons he willingly released our private information to the federal government.
No amount of name-calling is going stop us from demanding transparency from those who temporarily occupy elected positions of trust on our behalf.
