by Virginia Mercury

The University of Mary Washington invoked several FOIA exemptions to shield communications records showing how the university interacted with Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s office and the Virginia State Police before breaking up a pro-Palestine encampment on campus, according to the FXBG Advance.

The university withheld eight emails under an exemption for information “relative to criminal intelligence or any terrorism investigation in the possession of the Virginia Fusion Intelligence Center.”

An additional two emails were withheld under a transparency exemption for “working papers and correspondence” of the governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general.

FXBG Advance, a nonprofit news outlet focused on the Fredericksburg region, requested communications in the three days leading up to the April 27 protest clampdown.

Megan Rhyne, executive director of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government, told FXBG Advance the university cannot use an exemption that applies to other government officials but not the university itself.

“It’s not up to [UMW] to assert the exemption on behalf of someone else,” Rhyne said. “The university can only use its own exemptions.”

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