What’s important is that public documents belong to the people of this nation, who ought to be able to see them without first filing a lawsuit. The Obama administration doesn’t seem to agree.

Public records belong equally to Republicans, Democrats or independents. They belong equally to Trump supporters and Clinton supporters. They belong to people who think the TPP is a grand idea and those who think it would be an awful deal.

President Obama says all the right things about government transparency, but he fails to deliver. Recent developments involving documents that might shed light on Clinton’s shifting position on TPP and other issues make this clear, as does a pattern of conduct and behavior by his administration throughout his two terms.

The Obama administration has also gone to great lengths to track down anonymous whistleblowers, and has brought more cases against whistleblowers under the Espionage Act than every previous administration combined. The administration has targeted journalists, simply for doing their jobs, even seizing the phone records of an Associated Press reporter in one case.