George Washington University will not fight to block the FBI from searching more than 200 boxes of documents recently donated to the university from the estate of the late journalist Jack Anderson, officials said.
The documents, which have not officially been transferred but are being housed at the school’s library, contain decades worth of documents Anderson and his team of journalists — including Fox News Channel’s Brit Hume, The Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz and CNN’s Ed Henry — used to write the syndicated Washington Merry-Go-Round column.
FBI officials contacted the university and the Anderson family in hopes of removing any confidential or top-secret information before
the files were released to the public.
Anderson “would probably come out of his skin at the thought of the FBI going through his papers,” Anderson’s son Kevin told the Chronicle of Higher Education. Any tampering with the archive would “destroy any academic, scholarly, and historic value” it had, he said. The family plans to fight the request, which is likely to be decided in a courtroom.
GW President Stephen Joel Trachtenberg said the school is waiting for a legal opinion before entering into the debate.
“Luckily, it is not our issue yet,” Trachtenberg told The Examiner. “I find it hard to believe that there would be anything consequential after all these years.
“But if there happens to be something of importance, it would appear to be the rational thing for the FBI to say, ‘We want to take them back.’ ”
Freedom of information advocates have grown increasingly concerned since hundreds of documents at the National Archives were reclassified as a result of the Sept. 11 attacks.
Trachtenberg said he will let the “due process of law” figure out the controversy and will comply with any rulings.
Fast facts
» GW is spending an estimated $100,000 to index the archive.
» Officials hope the controversy will spark interest in the papers and help raise money to cover costs.
» Anderson won the 1972 Pulitzer Prize for his reports on the Indo-Pakistan War.
» Anderson battled Parkinson’s disease in the final 15 years of his life.
