Center for Media & Democracy v. Hunter

The Oklahoma Supreme Court stayed enforcement of a trial court order that directed the Oklahoma attorney general to respond to requests under the Oklahoma Open Records Act (ORA) for records regarding alleged industry ties of former Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt. As Oklahoma attorney general, Pruitt challenged a number of EPA regulations, including the Clean Power Plan. The ORA lawsuit was filed after Pruitt’s nomination as EPA administrator. The plaintiff was Center for Media and Democracy, which submitted seven records requests between January 2015 and January 2017. The attorney general’s office acknowledged receipt of each request, but responded only to say that it continued to review the potentially responsive documents and was limited in its ability to respond because it had received so many other ORA requests. On February 16, 2017, the day before Pruitt’s confirmation as EPA administrator, the trial court issued an order finding that for the documents requested in January 2015 there had been an “abject failure to provide prompt and reasonable access.” The court ordered that those documents be produced by February 21. The trial court also ordered the Oklahoma attorney general to produce documents in response to requests made between November 2015 and August 2016 within 10 days. The Oklahoma attorney general produced documents responsive to the January 2015 request but asked the Oklahoma Supreme Court for an emergency stay of the remainder of the order, arguing that the trial court had in effect granted the plaintiff partial summary judgment sua sponte, without allowing the attorney general a meaningful opportunity to be heard. The Oklahoma Supreme Court did not comment on the merits of the attorney general’s appeal in its order granting the stay.