Justice for Kennedy bill

The bill was put up by Arizona congress critter, David Schweikert (Rep).

https://www.congress.gov/118/bills/hr637/BILLS-118hr637ih.pdf

It's fine as far as it goes - and if successful - a long-overdue victory for transparency.

It just doesn't go the whole nine yards. It does not include assassination records held in private hands. 

To that extent, it will be a victory without meaning beyond transparency.

It will be a victory worthy of tapping a goon bag, not breaking out the Dom Perignon.

Nothing will change, but a few I guess can rightly feel like they achieved sometthing.

It just doesn't go the whole nine yards. It does not include assassination records held in private hands.

 
So I guess it doesn't cover Darnell and Weigman.

Removing the court seal exemption is important and would be great for research, but I could easily see this backfiring. If everything in the ARC was released the government could just say “case closed” and shut down any legal efforts to obtain records in private hands like the Darnell and Weigman films, plus additional records from federal agencies that are not in the ARC.

However, the bill does make liberal use of the term “assassination record” and doesn’t specify federal records that are already in the ARC, so to enforce the bill Congress etc. might be willing to form a new ARRB-like body to compel agencies to conduct additional record searches. In the unlikely event that happened, the JFK Act should still be the overriding law, which would, in theory, allow the “board” to obtain records in private hands, I think.

The combined probability of the bill passing and the subsequent constitution of a new independent body with the power and willingness to get the Darnell and Weigman films and other ”new” assassination records is effectively zero however, so I’m not gonna hold my breath.
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In the EF thread, Larry Schnapf acknowledges the new bill wrongly uses the 1992 definition of JFK Act, instead of the much broader ARRB definition, specifically including records not held by government agencies.  He has said that before and he and Bill Simpich have said they will pursue those records. Even mentioning Darnell and Wiegman in the process (Simpich seemed especially strong on that point). That may turn out to be a major accomplishment of their suit if it gets that far.

I just posted to the the thread a note that the ARBB definition is so important, Schnapf ought to suggest to his Congress connection that an amendment to the bill be considered that would strike the reference to the definition in the Act and replace it with the ARRB definition.

Roger Odisio wrote:In the EF thread, Larry Schnapf acknowledges the new bill wrongly uses the 1992 definition of JFK Act, instead of the much broader ARRB definition, specifically including records not held by government agencies.  He has said that before and he and Bill Simpich have said they will pursue those records. Even mentioning Darnell and Wiegman in the process (Simpich seemed especially strong on that point). That may turn out to be a major accomplishment of their suit if it gets that far.

I just posted to the the thread a note that the ARBB definition is so important, Schnapf ought to suggest to his Congress connection that an amendment to the bill be considered that would strike the reference to the definition in the Act and replace it with the ARRB definition.

Thanks Roger.

Larry Schnapf's latest on the subject:

"100% agree on materials outside the collection. the ARRB went out of business in 1998 but its work was not done.
I will be speaking with Schweikert's office next week."

Larry has become a tiger on the subject.