Presidential e-mail mess

Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2009 | 2:06 a.m.

In one of its last acts, the Bush administration essentially thumbed its nose at a federal judge, defying an order to search for and archive millions of White House e-mails.

After spending several years fighting a lawsuit by two nonprofit groups seeking the preservation of the e-mails, administration lawyers on Friday said the court lacked authority to order the White House to search for missing e-mails in the offices of the president and vice president.

The audacity of the statement would be stunning if it were from any other administration, but from the Bush White House, it was predictable. The outgoing administration has gone to great lengths to keep its workings secret and created an unofficial policy of fighting, at taxpayer expense, requests for public information.

The lawsuit was filed after the White House’s claim that it had lost e-mails sent from 2003 to 2005. The plaintiffs asked a judge to order the White House staff to search for the e-mails and, if they were found, properly archive them. These e-mails could contain critical information regarding the administration’s handling of the Iraq war and the firings of nine U.S. attorneys.

Last week, a judge told the White House to search all of its computers and electronic storage devices for the missing e-mails and order current and former employees to turn over old messages. White House officials showed no interest in doing so. They said they had found more than 14 million messages, but what will happen to those and other e-mails is unclear. It appears the administration would be happy to see them expire along with Bush’s term today. We hope the courts will act to stop a precedent from being set for future presidents.

The new president, Barack Obama, has pledged to increase government transparency and involve the public in government. The end of President George W. Bush’s disgraceful approach to public records will be a good start to Obama’s administration.