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CAFO-EPA lawsuit in favor of farm groups

An attorney says a recent federal appeals court ruling confirms EPA violated the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) after releasing private information about farmers and ranchers to the public.

American Farm Bureau Public Policy Counsel Danielle Quist tells Brownfield the federation and National Pork Producers Council challenged EPA in court after learning private farm information was about to be made public.  “The fact that an individual may have their information located on websites in government regulatory agencies or Facebook or out in the public, that doesn’t mean you lost your right to control that information.”

Quist says in 2013, EPA released private information of farmers in 29 states after several activist groups had filed a request. EPA then refused to recall all of the data and farm groups stepped into challenge the agency when it prepared to release farm information from six more states.  “People that were listed on these websites were not necessarily concentrated animal feeding operations, they were really anybody that somehow was registered in a state as owning livestock or poultry, and in some cases they weren’t even livestock or poultry producers, they were row crop farmers.”

The original suit was dismissed by a U.S. district court at the end of 2015 and was unanimously overturned with the appellate court saying EPA “abused its discretion in deciding that the information was not exempt from mandatory disclosure.” Quist says the ruling sets a major privacy precedent for those in agriculture and others.

AUDIO: Interview with Danielle Quist