Iowa is not a state that has been reported as having StingRay surveillance devices, which is why were surprised when the Department of Public Safety responded to our Cell Site Simulator census with a $147.90 invoice for records processing fees. After payment and some waiting, we finally received Iowa’s response, and instead of a fresh batch of records to pore over, what we got was another example of expansive exemptions used to withhold information about these devices.

Last week, we looked at the early days of the CIA’s foray into extrasensory espionage. Today we’ll be following up with the veterans of the NSA’s psychic wars, which they saw being waged into the ’90s and beyond.

National Institutes of Health recently published a catastrophically flawed case report on kratom, with multiple references which directly contradict the paper’s conclusions, and one source that simply doesn’t exist.

Between 1975 and 1976, Senator Frank Church carried out a televised campaign to reign in the U.S. intelligence community. The “Church Committee,“ as it was later known, held hundreds of hearings, published hundreds of pages of reports, and revealed some of the CIA, NSA, and FBI’s most sinister and illegal plots. Now, internal documents released in the recent CREST deluge reveal that even after his 1984 death, Frank Church was still trolling the CIA.

Public records can be your direct line to the government. Learn which ones you can and can’t request and how to file your own.

Attend any of the protests over inauguration weekend? Wondering if your phone was surveilled doing so? Unfortunately, with law enforcement’s continued silence about cell site simulators use, it’s almost impossible to know.

Read our weekly series looking at the stories public records made possible before the inevitable gag order comes down.

A considerable chunk of the CIA’s declassified archives consists of newspaper and magazine clippings. Some are stories relevant to Agency interest, others - typically critical - concern the CIA directly, and then there are the ones that don’t immediately make sense - like cookie recipes.

For years, Massachusetts has had a reputation for some of the country’s best universities, best sports teams, and worst public records law. Will the revisions that went into effect on January 1st finally change things? Join us February 2nd and let’s talk about it!

EPA Transition briefing materials, and materials prepared by other agencies, provide a valuable road map not just on how to run an agency, but also about what operations of that agency could be shut down entirely.

Other Kansas agencies have provided responses, so what is it about Olathe, Kansas that makes their materials secret? We’ve asked the state AG to help us find out.

Documents released through the CIA’s CREST archive offer new insights into American psychic spy programs. These documents claim specific successes by both the American and Russian/Soviet programs, as well as outline fears of a widening “psychic gap.”

With millions of undocumented immigrants estimated to live in the U.S., the Trump administration’s moves towards stricter immigration and detention regulations are all signs pointing toward profit for an established network of private prison operators.

On November 8, Massachusetts voters passed Question 4, which legalized recreational marijuana use - but the ballot measure didn’t go into effect until December 15. During that period, the Massachusetts State Police continued to make marijuana-related arrests. Help us find out how many of those are for conduct that is now legal.

Planning materials for the CIA’s 40th anniversary celebration released as part of the CREST database include a list of potential party themes and slogans. And while most of them are fairly straightforward, a few - like “We Have Met The Enemy, And He Is Still There” - stand out as downright bizarre.

Following Mike Best’s reporting of an FBI investigation potentially involving Trump’s Treasury pick Steven Mnuchin, Senator Sherrod Brown asked the FBI to release the files and made a point of bringing up the matter during Mnuchin’s confirmation hearing. While Mnuchin’s response may not have been a lies, they were not accurate, and raises several more questions.

The Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department has had StingRay cell site simulator devices since 2012, according to recently released documents.

In a 1981 letter to an unidentified Ambassador, former CIA Director Willam Casey thanked him for the surprise gift of two cases of beer. If you’re wondering what kind of beer gets you on a spook’s good side, keep wondering - the brand is redacted on “confidential source” grounds.

We’ve been getting lots of questions about what FOIA will look like under the Trump administration: How much impact does one president have? Will FOIA be useless? Transparency can be hard to predict, but here’s what MuckRock’s Michael Morisy thinks might be coming.

One of the gems uncovered so far amid the 13 million pages of declassified CIA records released this week is a list of Soviet jokes prepared for the Agency’s Deputy Director. One joke in particular, poking fun at Ronald Reagan, stands out - and apparently, Reagan agreed, working it into his “stories from Russia” routine.

Take a break from Three Doors Down to read our weekly series looking at the stories public records made possible.

If you were hoping for divine intervention as a way out of the inauguration, we’ve got bad news - FEMA recently announced it had joined NASA and others to estimate its ability to counter potentially planet-threatening asteroids.

Kel McClanahan, the lawyer who represented MuckRock in our lawsuit against the CIA, outlines the three-year fight to get the agency to release its declassified database — and all the excuses the agency used for why it couldn’t be done.

Emails from North Dakota’s governor shows that police deployed to the #NoDAPL protests were expecting heavy resistance, with the call for assistance specifically requesting cops with chemical munitions, riot suppression, and active shooter training.

Back in December, we wrote about how the CIA, in response to our lawsuit and Emma Best’s diligence, would be placing its previously-inaccessible CREST database online. Today, we’re happy to announce that all 25 years worth of declassified documents are now available - no trip to the National Archives required.