White House to Testify on Presidential Records Act
WASHINGTON- The White House’s top administrative information officer will join the head of the National Archives in testifying to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on the Presidential Records Act, next Tuesday.
“The Presidential Records Act of 1978 was designed to ensure that generations to come may benefit from a thorough accounting of decisions made at the highest levels of government,” Chairman Issa said. “We need to ensure that this president and future presidents are free to use new technologies to interact with the public, but that we preserve transparency and accountability in those interactions.”
Official White House policy states that communication between the President and his staffers and third parties on social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook may be preserved as Presidential Records. Using Twitter as an example, the policy states that “the White House preserves posts (i.e. “tweets”) from official White House accounts, “direct messages” sent to official White House accounts and “replies.”
However, policies regarding the use of “unofficial” accounts for “official” communication are far from clear.
White House policy instructs staffers who receive emails on unofficial or personal accounts which contain official business to voluntarily preserve those emails as Presidential Records.
The policy does not address the preservation of records which may be generated from personal use of Twitter, Facebook, instant messaging, SMS, or other forms of communication.
The committee will discuss legislative and administrative solutions to current policy and technological challenges. Full hearing details below.
Title: “Presidential Records in the New Millennium: Updating the Presidential Records Act and Other Federal Recordkeeping Statutes to Improve Electronic Records Preservation”
Date/Time/Location: Tuesday May 3rd, 9:30 a.m., Room 2154 Rayburn House Office Building
Witnesses:
• Brook Colangelo, Chief Information Officer, White House Office of Administration, Executive Office of the President
• David S. Ferriero, Archivist of the United States, National Archives and Records Administration
This hearing will be webcast at https://oversight.house.gov.
###