President Bola Tinubu has asked a United States court to reject a bid for the further release of records relating to past investigations involving him, arguing that the documents are protected by privacy laws.
Tinubu, who joined the case as an intervenor, made the request in a legal response filed on Friday before the US District Court for the District of Columbia.
He urged the court to dismiss a motion for summary judgment filed by Aaron Greenspan, founder of PlainSite, and permit the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) to retain existing redactions and withholdings in documents already released.
Greenspan had submitted Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests seeking records concerning Tinubu, including what he described as the “entire FBI file” on the Nigerian president and FBI interview records from 1992 and 1993.
The requests formed part of 12 FOIA applications submitted to six US federal agencies for investigative records linked to a Chicago heroin-trafficking case from the early 1990s. Tinubu was one of four individuals named in the requests.
In April 2025, US District Judge Beryl Howell ruled that the FBI and DEA had improperly refused to confirm or deny whether they held records concerning Tinubu.
Howell ordered the agencies to search for and process non-exempt documents responsive to Greenspan’s requests.
The agencies subsequently released thousands of pages, some containing redactions, and provided a Vaughn index outlining the grounds for withholding specific information.
Greenspan later returned to court seeking further disclosure, arguing that the records released by the agencies did not fully satisfy his FOIA requests.
In the latest filing, however, Tinubu’s lawyers argued that FOIA was intended to promote transparency concerning government activities and not to provide information about private individuals contained in government files.
“Plaintiff’s motion should be denied because FOIA is not a tool for obtaining information the government collected about private individuals,” the lawyers argued.
The president’s legal team maintained that Greenspan’s requests were primarily aimed at obtaining personal information about Tinubu rather than determining whether the FBI, DEA or other government agencies properly carried out their official duties.
They cited a 1989 US Supreme Court ruling which held that disclosure of records concerning private citizens generally reveals little about government operations.
Tinubu’s lawyers also invoked FOIA Exemption 7(C), which protects law-enforcement records where disclosure could constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy, as well as relevant provisions of the US Privacy Act.
They argued that the FBI and DEA had therefore “properly redacted or withheld exempt information” from the documents released.
The legal team further rejected Greenspan’s contention that Judge Howell’s 2025 ruling, which barred the FBI and DEA from relying on “Glomar” responses to refuse confirmation of the existence of records, had eliminated Tinubu’s privacy rights over the contents of the files.
A Glomar response allows a government agency to refuse to confirm or deny whether responsive records exist.
According to Tinubu’s lawyers, Howell’s ruling distinguished between the president’s privacy interest in concealing the fact that he had been investigated and his separate privacy interest in the contents of any investigative records.
They argued that the 2025 ruling dealt with the former issue but did not order the release of the contents of investigative files.
The lawyers also maintained that the existence of information about Tinubu’s past in the public domain did not automatically extinguish his privacy rights over information that remained undisclosed in government records.
Tinubu’s team further challenged Greenspan’s claim that there was a legitimate public interest in releasing the records because Tinubu is Nigeria’s president.
They argued that public curiosity about the president’s background, political career or suitability for office did not constitute the type of public interest recognised under FOIA.
“Plaintiff’s interest in an individual or that individual’s activities is not a ‘public interest’ that FOIA recognizes,” the lawyers argued.
They added that Greenspan’s court filings showed that his primary objective was to obtain information about Tinubu, rather than investigate potential misconduct by the FBI, DEA or other US government agencies.
The legal team also described suggestions of a secret prosecution or government cover-up as “unsubstantiated allegations,” arguing that Greenspan had not presented sufficient evidence of government wrongdoing to warrant further disclosure.
Tinubu’s lawyers also opposed Greenspan’s challenges to the agencies’ searches, the DEA’s Vaughn index, the exemptions claimed by the agencies and their handling of segregable information.
The president is asking the court to dismiss Greenspan’s motion for summary judgment and allow the existing redactions and withholdings by the FBI and DEA to remain.
Greenspan filed the FOIA requests in 2022 and 2023, seeking records from the CIA, FBI, DEA, Internal Revenue Service, Executive Office for United States Attorneys and the US Department of State.
The requests concerned investigative records connected to the Chicago drug-trafficking case and named Tinubu, Lee Andrew Edwards, Mueez Abegboyega Akande and Abiodun Agbele.
Several agencies initially issued Glomar responses, saying they could neither confirm nor deny the existence of responsive records.
However, in her April 2025 ruling, Howell held that the FBI and DEA had failed to establish a sufficient privacy interest to keep secret the fact that Tinubu had been the subject of a criminal investigation.
She ordered the agencies to search for and process non-exempt records while upholding the CIA’s Glomar response.
Tinubu has consistently denied wrongdoing in connection with the allegations.
