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: Virginia Qui Tam Law

The ACLU's Ill-Advised Publicity Stunt Comes to an End

By Zachary A. Kitts

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Today, Judge O'Grady issued his opinion in ACLU et al., v. Eric Holder, et al. 1:09cv042 (E.D.Va.) thus ending an ill-advised publicity stunt by the ACLU, some entity calling itself "Government Accountability Project" and another called "OMB Watch."

The ACLU's complaint sought to strike down the seal provisions of the federal False Claims Act. I previously posted a copy of Taxpayers Against Fraud's amicus brief supporting the Department of Justice's position.

Plaintiffs brought three distinct challenges to the seal provisions of the FCA. First, they argued that the seal provisions are facially unconstitutional because the seal denies access to information of paramount public interest. Second, the ACLU argued that the seal provisions of the FCA are content-based restrictions that "gag" relators from speaking about the case. Third, the ACLU argued that the seal provisions infringe on a district court's inherent authority to decide on a case by case basis whether a particular FCA case should be sealed; the ACLU argued that this is a violation of the separation of powers doctrine.

In his well-reasoned opinion, Judge O'Grady dismisses these frivolous claims. He also cites the amicus brief filed by Taxpayers Against Fraud in a footnote.

Special thanks go to Jeb White, Cleveland Lawrence, and Thea Cohen from Taxpayers Against Fraud and J. Marc Vezina of Vezina & Gattuso for their work on the amicus brief.

Full post as published by Virginia Qui Tam Law on August 21, 2009 (boomark / email).