Elections
The legal representatives argue that Greenspan’s demands inquire about Tinubu included in federal government files, consisting of law-enforcement records, instead of product that would demonstrate how the firms performed their tasks.
Lawyers for Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu have actually asked a federal court in Washington to turn down Aaron Greenspan’s quote for extra records about him, arguing that the product issues Tinubu’s personal life before he got in politics and is safeguarded by personal privacy laws.
In a filing dated August 28, 2026, in Greenspan v. Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, Tinubu’s legal representatives asked the court to reject Greenspan’s movement for summary judgment and leave in location the FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration’s redactions and withholdings.
Tinubu intervened in the claim to secure his interests in records held by the firms.
The attorneys argue that Greenspan’s demands inquire about Tinubu consisted of in federal government files, consisting of law-enforcement records, instead of product that would demonstrate how the firms performed their responsibilities.
They state disclosure might attack the personal privacy of individuals called in those files without advancing a public interest acknowledged under the Freedom of Information Act(FOIA).
The filing puts specific focus on when the records were produced. It states the occasions at concern precede Tinubu’s presidency which he was a civilian at the time.
“Regardless, Intervenor ought to keep his complete personal privacy interests due to the fact that he was not a public authorities in 1993,”the short states, including that “Plaintiff’s FOIA demands look for 3 years old records relating to occasions that happened when Intervenor was a trainee. “
The attorneys compete that Tinubu’s later election to public workplace did not eliminate the personal privacy securities that use to records about his earlier personal life.
Citing a D.C. Circuit precedent, they state that public authorities do not”surrender their individual privacy for FOIA functions”since of their positions.
The filing likewise prices estimate a 2024 district court judgment including background-check records, arguing that a requester”does not discuss how a person’s background examination files show what the federal government firms [he] led were’as much as.’ ”
Tinubu’s legal representatives rely primarily on FOIA Exemption 7 (C), which allows companies to keep particular law-enforcement details when disclosure might fairly be anticipated to make up a baseless intrusion of individual privacy.
They likewise mention the Privacy Act as an independent basis for safeguarding info about people.
The filing conflicts Greenspan’s dependence on the public-domain teaching, the concept that info currently formally revealed might no longer be kept on the exact same basis. Tinubu’s legal representatives argue
that the 1993 civil forfeit case including funds kept in accounts bearing his name, and an accompanying affidavit by Special Agent Kevin Moss, exposed just the presence of a forfeit action.
They state those files did not divulge”the information of a possible criminal examination (or its outcomes) including Intervenor. ”
Citing the U.S. Supreme Court’s choice in Department of Justice v. Reporters Committee for Freedom of journalism, the legal representatives argue that an individual might maintain a personal privacy interest in concealed details in federal government files even when some associated information have actually formerly ended up being public.
They likewise challenge Greenspan’s claim that the records would serve a public interest under FOIA.
The filing argues that “the Nigerian public’s basic interest” in Tinubu’s background and any interest in “affecting politics in a foreign country” are not the sort of interests the law is created to advance.
FOIA’s function, they state, is to clarify the U.S. federal government’s activities, not to please “public interest” about a person.
The case issues Greenspan’s efforts to acquire records linked to federal examinations into a Chicago-area heroin-trafficking operation in the early 1990s.
The legal representatives characterise the demands as inquiring about a personal specific instead of proof of federal government misbehavior.
They turn down recommendations that the demands are validated by a presumed secret prosecution or cover-up, arguing that claims of federal government misdeed need proof.
A 2025 judgment in the very same case compared a firm verifying whether it held records and divulging the contents of investigative files.
The court enabled the CIA to decline to verify or reject whether it had responsive records, however directed the FBI and DEA to look for and procedure non-exempt product.
The judgment did not figure out whether the historic accusations including Tinubu held true.
The present conflict is over which tapes the companies should launch and which might be kept under personal privacy and law-enforcement securities.
Tinubu’s filing provides his legal representatives’ arguments; it is not a last judgment by the court.
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