Meetings
 | This section needs to be updated.(January 2021) |
The Public Interest Declassification Board (PIDB) is an advisory committee established by the United States Congress with the official mandate of promoting the fullest possible public access to a thorough, accurate, and reliable documentary record of significant U.S. national security decisions and activities. The Board is composed of nine individuals: five appointed by the President of the United States and one each appointed by the Speaker of the House, House Minority Leader, Senate Majority Leader, and Senate Minority Leader. Appointees must be U.S. citizens preeminent in the fields of history, national security, foreign policy, intelligence policy, social science, law, or archives.
Established by the Public Interest Declassification Act of 2000 (Title VII of P.L. 106–567, 114 Stat. 2856), the board advises the President of the United States regarding issues pertaining to national classification and declassification policy. Section 1102 of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 extended and modified the Board.
The director of the Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO) serves as the executive secretary of the PIDB, and ISOO staff provides support on a reimbursable basis. In December 2020, President Donald Trump appointed Acting Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Ezra Cohen to chair the Public Interest Declassification Board. [1]
The Board is assigned functions and membership by the Public Interest Declassification Act of 2000 (P.L. 106–567, December 27, 2000) as amended by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, notably section 703.
The U.S. president selects the chairperson from among the members. The members may elect from among the members a Vice Chairperson who fills in when the chairperson is not present.
Meetings of the Board are only official when a quorum is present, which by law is a majority of the members. Such meetings of the board are by law generally open to the public. In those instances where the Board finds it necessary to conduct business at a closed meeting, attendance at meetings of the Board shall be limited to those persons necessary for the Board to fulfill its functions in a complete and timely manner, as determined by the chairperson. The Executive Secretary is responsible for the preparation of each meeting's minutes and the distribution of draft minutes to members. Approved minutes will be maintained among the records of the Board.
Decisions can be made by Board votes at meetings or by the membership outside the context of a formal Board meeting. The Executive Secretary shall record and retain such votes in a documentary form and immediately report the results to the chairperson and other members.
The staff of NARA's Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO) provide program and administrative support for the Board and the office director serves as Executive Secretary to the Board. The Board may seek detailees from its member agencies to augment the staff of the Information Security Oversight Office in support of the Board.
Board records are maintained by the Executive Secretary. Freedom of Information Act requests and other requests for a document that originated within an agency other than the Board are referred to that agency.
Article VIII sets forth the procedures for considering a proper request under the Act from a committee of jurisdiction in the Congress for the Board to make a recommendation to the President regarding the declassification of certain records.
Standards for decision. A recommendation to declassify a record in whole or in part requires a determination by the Board, after careful consideration of the views of the original classifying authority, that declassification is in the public interest. A decision to recommend declassification in whole or in part requires the affirmative vote of a majority of a quorum of the Board, and of no less than four members of the Board, and the vote of each member present shall be recorded. Resolution of Requests. The Board may recommend that the President: (1) take no action pursuant to the request; (2) declassify the record(s) in whole or in part, pursuant to action taken in accordance with paragraph C; or (3) remand the matter to the agency responsible for the record(s) for further consideration and a timely response to the Board. Notification. The chair shall promptly convey to the President, through the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs and to the agency head responsible for the record(s), the Board's recommendation, including a written justification for its recommendation. The approval and amendment of these bylaws shall require the affirmative vote of at least five of the Board's members. The Executive Secretary shall submit the approved bylaws and their amendments for publication in the Federal Register. Protection of Classified Information. Any classified information contained in the request file shall be handled and protected in accordance with the Order and its implementing directives. Information that is subject to a request for declassification under this section shall remain classified unless and until a final decision is made by the President or by the agency head responsible for the record(s) to declassify it.
Decisions to declassify and release information rest with the President or the agency responsible for the records, not this Board.
The Board reports annually to Congress. Amendments to the Board's bylaws are published in the Federal Register .
| This section needs to be updated.(January 2021) |
On May 27, 2009, President Barack Obama signed a presidential memorandum ordering the review of Executive Order 12958, as amended "Classified National Security Information". The review of the Order is to be completed within 90 days. On June 2, 2009, the National Security Advisor asked the PIDB to assist in this review by soliciting recommendations for revisions to the Order to ensure adequate public input as the review moves forward.
The PIDB was soliciting recommendations via the Declassification Policy Forum, here.
The four topics of discussion were:
The Forum had a very productive discussion and received more than 150 thoughtful comments from members of the public. The Public Interest Declassification Board has sent a letter and a summary of the comments to the National Security Advisor.
It ran from June 29 through July 19, 2009.
The United States National Security Council (NSC) is the principal forum used by the president of the United States for consideration of national security, military, and foreign policy matters. Based in the White House, it is part of the Executive Office of the President of the United States, and composed of senior national security advisors and Cabinet officials.
John David Podesta Jr. is an American political consultant who has served as senior advisor to the president for clean energy innovation and implementation since September 2022. Podesta previously served as White House chief of staff to President Bill Clinton from 1998 to 2001 and counselor to President Barack Obama from 2014 to 2015. Before that, he served in the Clinton administration as White House staff secretary from 1993 to 1995 and White House deputy chief of staff for operations from 1997 to 1998.
The director of national intelligence (DNI) is a senior, cabinet-level United States government official, required by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 to serve as executive head of the United States Intelligence Community (IC) and to direct and oversee the National Intelligence Program (NIP). All IC agencies report directly to the DNI. The DNI also serves, upon invitation, as an advisor to the president of the United States, the National Security Council and the Homeland Security Council on all intelligence matters. The DNI, supported by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), produces the President's Daily Brief (PDB), a classified document including intelligence from all IC agencies, handed each morning to the president of the United States.
The Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) is an intelligence agency in the United States Department of State. Its central mission is to provide all-source intelligence and analysis in support of U.S. diplomacy and foreign policy. INR is the oldest civilian element of the U.S. Intelligence Community and among the smallest, with roughly 300 personnel. Though lacking the resources and technology of other U.S. intelligence agencies, it is "one of the most highly regarded" for the quality of its work.
The National Security Archive is a 501(c)(3) non-governmental, non-profit research and archival institution located on the campus of the George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Founded in 1985 to check rising government secrecy. The National Security Archive is an investigative journalism center, open government advocate, international affairs research institute, and the largest repository of declassified U.S. documents outside the federal government. The National Security Archive has spurred the declassification of more than 15 million pages of government documents by being the leading non-profit user of the U.S. Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), filing a total of more than 70,000 FOIA and declassification requests in its over 35+ years of history.
Nancy Elisabeth Soderberg is an American foreign policy strategist who currently serves as Resident Director for National Democratic Institute in Kosovo. Soderberg served as the third-ranking official on the Clinton Administration's National Security Council from 1993 to 1997 and as an Alternate Representative to the United Nations as a Presidential Appointee, with the rank of Ambassador, from 1997 to 2001. She has also held positions at the International Crisis Group, Connect U.S. Fund, and the Public Interest Declassification Board. In 2012 she ran unsuccessfully for Florida Senate District 4. Soderberg ran for Congress as a Democrat in the 2018 midterm elections in Florida's 6th congressional district.
David Kemp Karnes was an American politician, businessman, and attorney. He was a United States Senator from Nebraska from 1987 to 1989, and was president and chief executive officer of The Fairmont Group Incorporated, a merchant banking/consulting company with offices in Omaha and the District of Columbia. Karnes also served in an "of counsel" capacity to the national law firm of Kutak Rock and practiced out of the firm's Omaha, Nebraska and Washington, D.C. offices. Karnes was also involved in numerous civic, educational, and charitable organizations both in Nebraska and nationally.
The Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO) is responsible to the President for policy and oversight of the government-wide security classification system and the National Industrial Security Program in the United States. The ISOO is a component of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) and receives policy and program guidance from the National Security Council (NSC).
Robert Michael Kimmitt was United States Deputy Secretary of the Treasury under President George W. Bush. He was nominated by President Bush on June 29, 2005. The United States Senate unanimously confirmed him on July 29, 2005, and he was sworn into office on August 16, 2005. Kimmitt served through the end of the Bush administration, leaving office on January 20, 2009.
The Executive Committee of the National Security Council was a body of United States government officials that convened to advise President John F. Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. It was composed of the regular members of the National Security Council, along with other men whose advice the President deemed useful during the crisis. EXCOMM was formally established by National Security Action Memorandum 196 on October 22, 1962. It was made up of twelve full members in addition to the president. Advisers frequently sat in on the meetings, which were held in the Cabinet Room of the White House's West Wing and secretly recorded by tape machines activated by Kennedy. None of the other committee members knew the meetings were being recorded, save probably the president's brother, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.
The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) is an independent agency within the executive branch of the United States government, established by Congress in 2004 to advise the President and other senior executive branch officials to ensure that concerns with respect to privacy and civil liberties in the United States are appropriately considered in the development and implementation of all laws, regulations, and executive branch policies related to terrorism.
United States Intelligence Community Oversight duties are shared by both the executive and legislative branches of the government. Oversight, in this case, is the supervision of intelligence agencies, and making them accountable for their actions. Generally oversight bodies look at the following general issues: following policymaker needs, the quality of analysis, operations, and legality of actions.
Neal Steven Wolin is the CEO of the corporate advisory firm Brunswick Group, an equity partner of Data Collective, a board partner of Social Capital, and a limited partner advisor of Nyca Partners. He is the longest-serving Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of the Treasury and also served as Acting Secretary of the Treasury in early 2013.
Martin Clark Faga was the tenth director of the National Reconnaissance Office (DNRO).
Charles B. Curtis is an American lawyer, currently senior advisor (nonresident) to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, vice chair of the United States Department of State's International Security Advisory Board, 2011 through 2017, former member of the National Academies Intelligence Science and Technology Experts Group, and President Emeritus of the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI), a non-profit organization working to reduce the threats from nuclear, biological and chemical weapons. In addition to working in private practice for more than sixteen years, Curtis served as the last chairman of the Federal Power Commission and the first chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission from 1977 to 1981. In 1994 he was appointed and confirmed as undersecretary and then deputy secretary of the US Department of Energy. He has held positions on the staff of the U.S. House of Representatives, the U.S. Treasury Department, and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
James E. Baker is an American attorney, judge, and academic. He is the former Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces. He was appointed to the Court on September 19, 2000, by President Bill Clinton, and became its Chief Judge upon the expiration of Andrew S. Effron's term on September 30, 2011. He is currently a professor of Law and Public Administration at Syracuse University and Director of the Institute for Security Policy and Law. Baker is a Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration.
Rajesh "Raj" De is an American lawyer and former U.S. government official who later became the managing partner for the Washington, D.C., office of the law firm Mayer Brown. During the presidency of Barack Obama, he served in three significant government roles—as Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Policy, as White House Staff Secretary, and finally as general counsel of the U.S. National Security Agency.
Stephen Brent Slick is a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operations officer and United States National Security Council official. He is the inaugural director of the Intelligence Studies Project at the University of Texas at Austin, where he is also a Clinical Professor at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs and the Bobby R. Inman Chair in Intelligence Studies.
This article incorporates public domain material from Public Interest Declassification Board (PIDB) - Members. United States Government.
Trump also tapped Ezra Cohen-Watnick, the acting undersecretary of Defense for intelligence and security, to chair the Public Interest Declassification Board.