Sens. Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Mark Udall (D-CO) have been warning Americans for months about the intelligence community’s reliance on secret interpretations of law under the PATRIOT Act, arguing that the Justice Department has allowed for a secret interpretation of the law that is beyond the bounds of the law and allowing for broad surveillance of Americans.

The administration has consistently refused to explain its own interpretation of that law.

In steps the traditional media.

Given all of this, reporter Charlie Savage of the NY Times filed a Freedom of Information Act request to find out the federal government's interpretation of its own law... and had it refused. According to the federal government, its own interpretation of the law is classified. What sort of democracy are we living in when the government can refuse to even say how it's interpreting its own law? That's not democracy at all. Julian Sanchez points us to the news that Savage and the NY Times have now sued the federal government for not revealing its interpretation of the PATRIOT Act, pointing out that if parts of the interpretation contain classified material, the Justice Department should black that out and reveal the rest, but simply refusing to reveal the interpretation entirely is a violation of the Freedom of Information Act

So the New York Times is suing the government for refusing to reveal its interpretation of the PATRIOT Act. They argue that if the administration's interpretation of the law does contain classified materials, it can be redacted, "but simply refusing to reveal the interpretation entirely is a violation of the Freedom of Information Act."

The fact that Wyden and Udall, not known for their rabble-rousing or being anything other than cautious, responsible legislators. That they have this level of alarm over the administration's interpretation of the law was enough to catch the interest of one of the nation's best investigative reporters—Charlie Savage, and for his employer to sue. The administration has been pretty effective at blocking any lawsuits touching on warrantless wiretapping or the conduct of the war on terrorism, so expect them to fight this.

You can read the complaint against the government at Techdirt.

