FOIA Redactions — Paid Consultation on Blacked-Out and Withheld Pages
A paid consultation with Sherrod Seward, Esq. on a release that came back blacked out, and on what the agency has to be able to show for it.
A redacted release is not a refusal, and it is frequently the most testable response there is, because the agency has committed itself in writing to a position on each withholding. Two obligations sit behind every black box. An agency may withhold only where it reasonably foresees that disclosure would harm an interest the exemption protects, or where disclosure is prohibited by law. And it must still release any reasonably segregable portion of the record. You will leave the call knowing whether what you received is consistent with both.
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Request the consultation
Six fields. About a minute.
Bring the call one of these
- Whole pages came back black with nothing readable left on them.
- The redactions carry no exemption codes, so there is nothing to test.
- The parts withheld are precisely the parts you asked for.
- You were given a summary, or a partial release, and told that is all there is.
- You need to know whether this is worth appealing before spending anything more on it.
Two things an agency has to be able to say about every black box
First, harm. Withholding does not follow automatically from citing an exemption: an agency may withhold only if it reasonably foresees that disclosure would harm an interest protected by that exemption, or if disclosure is prohibited by law. Second, segregability. Any reasonably segregable portion of a record has to be released once the exempt portions are deleted, and the amount of information deleted and the exemption relied on should be indicated at the place in the record where the deletion was made, where that is technically feasible. A release that is black from margin to margin, carrying no codes and no indication of what was removed, is one that has not visibly done either.
This office has been the plaintiff, not only the drafter
Law Offices of Sherrod Seward, PLLC v. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services
No. 3:25-cv-00057 (W.D.N.C.), filed January 2025
This office has been the plaintiff in a Freedom of Information Act case, not only the drafter of the request. When an agency declined to produce records, the firm filed suit in its own name under 5 U.S.C. 552 to compel production.
A pending matter is described here as a fact about this office's own experience. It is not a result, it does not predict anything about any other case, and every case is decided on its own record. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.
How it runs
- Send the enquiryThe form below. Six fields, about a minute.
- Pay the consultation fee$500, on the firm's secure payment page. Credited in full against the fee for the engagement if this office is engaged on the matter.
- The consultationThe call itself. Bring the request, the response letter and the envelope — deadlines run from what the paper says.
- A written summaryWhat was decided, what the next step is, and the date it has to happen by.
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Questions people actually ask
What do I actually get for the fee?
The $500 is the fee for the consultation itself and for the written summary that follows it. It is not a retainer, and it does not include drafting or filing a FOIA request, an administrative appeal, a licence application, a delisting petition, a federal court complaint, a trademark application, a response to a USPTO office action, or a post-registration maintenance filing - each of those is separately scoped and separately quoted. Government, agency and court filing fees, any agency search, review or duplication fees, and any USPTO filing fees, are not included and are payable to the government, not to this office. On a government contract matter it likewise does not include preparing or certifying a claim to a contracting officer, a request for equitable adjustment, a termination settlement proposal, an agency-level protest, a protest at the Government Accountability Office, an appeal to an agency board of contract appeals, or a complaint in the United States Court of Federal Claims - each of those is separately scoped and separately quoted.
Is this legal advice?
The consultation is. This page is not — it is general information about federal practice, and reading it creates no relationship with this office. Sending this form does not create an attorney-client relationship. No attorney-client relationship is formed until this office and you have signed a written engagement agreement.
Can you tell me what my chances are?
You will get a candid assessment of what your record supports and where it is thin, which is the useful version of that question. What you will not get is a percentage. Every matter is decided on its own record by a government officer or a judge, and prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.
What happens if you cannot help?
You will be told so on the call, and told where the matter actually belongs. That happens often enough to be worth saying out loud.
Every page is redacted. Is that allowed?
Sometimes it is, and the way to find out is not to argue about the volume of black ink. It is to ask what interest each withholding protects, whether disclosure would foreseeably harm it, and whether anything on those pages could reasonably have been separated out and released. A wholesale withholding is the shape of release that tends not to survive those questions, but it depends on what the records actually are.
There are no exemption codes beside the redactions. Does that matter?
It matters practically, because unmarked redactions leave you with nothing specific to challenge and the agency with nothing it has committed to. Where deletions are made, the amount deleted and the exemption relied on should be indicated at the place in the record, if that is technically feasible. Asking for it is a legitimate and narrow request, and it is often the step that turns an unanswerable release into an answerable one.