Says Her Attorney General Must Have "Proven Commitment" to Openness WASHINGTON, March 16 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) says she is "committed to restoring open government" by not only mandating more open meetings and release of public documents, but also by nominating "an attorney general who has a proven commitment to open comes on the heels of a Sunshine Week public opinion survey by Scripps Howard News Service and Ohio University that found three- quarters of Americans think the federal government is secretive, and almost nine in 10 say where a presidential candidate stands on openness is something they consider when deciding who will get their vote.
Clinton's administration would operate with a presumption of openness, achieved by nominating an attorney general "who is committed to openness and transparency"; by directing agency and department heads to allow greater public scrutiny of the decision-making process; by training and auditing agency personnel to ensure overclassification and pseudo-classification are kept in check; and by safeguarding scientific conclusions from political interference.
"I would make it clear to everyone in the Executive Branch that I expect my administration to be open and responsive to the public," Clinton stated.
Clinton also said that if elected, she would disclose the donors to the Clinton Library and Clinton Foundation prospectively; she would roll back President Bush's executive order limiting the release of presidential records; and she would post federal contracts and budgets online.
The Clinton survey responses, and the results of the public opinion
survey can be found on the Sunshine Week Web site,
http://www.sunshineweek.org. Sunshine Week,
http://www.sunshineweek.org, is a non-partisan open government initiative led by the American Society of Newspaper Editors,
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