Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross used his personal email account to communicate with foreign officials, private citizens with interests before the Commerce Department, and white supremacist Charles “Chuck” Johnson. FOIA records revealed that, over the course of a year and a half, Ross used a private email account to send or receive hundreds of work-related emails. These emails have included:

• Correspondence with numerous domestic and foreign corporations with business before the Department of Commerce
• Discussions of meetings with numerous foreign officials, lobbyists, and CEOs
• Correspondence with Holocaust denier Chuck Johnson
• Correspondence with former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich about a Republican Party donor interested in investment opportunities
• Emails from Ambassador — and later Acting Director of National Intelligence — Richard Grenell about meetings with foreign manufacturers

The Federal Records Act requires all federal officers to copy or forward to their official account every government-related email they send from private email accounts. But after our FOIA lawsuit revealed Secretary Ross complied with the law only one-third of the time, the Commerce Department refused to search Ross’ personal email account for additional relevant records.

Unsurprisingly, Ross is currently under federal investigation by the National Archives and Records Administration for his use of personal email accounts. In opening its probe, NARA cited a September 2019 Washington Post profile of Ross that relied on records obtained via our lawsuit.

Because it was clear Secretary Ross had used private email to conduct agency business, we demanded a thorough search of Ross’ private email accounts. We filed suit on February 2nd, 2018. On July 22nd, 2020, the federal court ruled that the Department’s refusal to conduct a thorough search of Ross’ private emails was unjustified.