FOIA website - 90% of requests are &quot;Under Agency Review&quot;? What am I missing?
<p><a href="https://foiaonline.gov/foiaonline/action/public/search/advancedSearch" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://foiaonline.gov/foiaonline/action/public/search/advancedSearch</a></p>
<p>The vast majority of entries on &quot;Under Agency Review&quot; with no details, requester names or requester organizations. Even requests submitted back in 2020. What am I missing? <strong>Does the FOIA just never get round to 90% of requests or is there something else?</strong></p>
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<p>ETA: My question is different than the one answered here: <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/65173/foia-request-takes-too-long">FOIA request takes too long</a></p>

<p>Government compliance with FOIA is notoriously bad.  I found the following article in the Duke Law Journal illuminating: <a href="https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3846&amp;context=dlj" rel="nofollow noreferrer">FOIA, INC.</a>.  There are some eye-opening statistics in there, like p.1375:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>At the end of FY 2014, the oldest pending requests across the federal
government dated back to 1993.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>More details on the response times from several large federal agencies begins on p.1423.  (The article goes into detail to show how, in those agencies, commercial requesters have overwhelmed even well-funded FOIA offices.)</p>
<p>It seems that the largest issue in compliance is a lack of resources.  Apparently, &quot;We don't have funding to comply with the law&quot; is an acceptable response for the executive branch.</p>

united-states foia