We are suing Gov. Beshear because transparency is worth fighting for | Opinion

The Lexington Herald-Leader is suing Gov. Andy Beshear because his office will not release the most basic information about what the governor is doing on the people’s behalf.

We’re suing because the people of Kentucky elected Beshear to do the people’s business, and as part of our 250-year-old social contract as Americans, we deserve to know what that is, where it is and with whom.

We’re suing because Kentucky’s Open Records Act is one of the most important laws in our state, and it should be upheld.

This decision was not made lightly; media companies no longer have expansive budgets for lawyers’ fees in long, drawn-out court cases. But standing up for the public’s right to know is one of the Fourth Estate’s most important jobs, and we take the charge to safeguard the walls of our sometimes crumbling democracy seriously.

This lawsuit — filed by First Amendment lawyer Michael Abate on our behalf Jan. 5 — seeks to not only force the governor’s office to turn over the daily schedules of Beshear, Lt. Gov. Jacqueline Coleman and senior adviser Rocky Adkins, but to overturn the Kentucky Court of Appeals decision upon which the governor is leaning, Courier-Journal v. Jones.

That 1995 decision, based on a dispute involving then-Gov. Brereton Jones’ calendar, upheld the idea that a calendar could be considered “preliminary,” therefore exempt from the Open Records Act.

But Abate noted that transparency laws have changed since then.

“Kentucky’s law is a bit of an outlier in this respect, and it treats even the completed schedule as a preliminary record for eternity,” Abate told the Herald-Leader. “Even when the governor has made public appearances, any records related to that under the Jones case are considered preliminary, which makes little, if any, logical sense.”

Beshear’s movements and meetings are particularly important these days as he makes the not very subtle moves to run for president in 2028. (Hint: his first podcast of 2026 was with a New Hampshire politician.) Shouldn’t voters know how he is dividing his time between governance in Kentucky and trips to Davos, Switzerland, or South Carolina and Nevada?

It’s true Beshear announces some of his trips in advance and holds weekly briefings for the media. But it is not up to him to decide what should be shared with the public and what should not.

Government secrecy is a bipartisan problem

Sadly, the fight against transparency is a bipartisan one, committed by politicians and public officials of every stripe. It’s getting worse, based on numerous attempts by the General Assembly to weaken our access laws.

Luckily, the Herald-Leader is not alone in this fight.

The nonprofit news outlet Kentucky Lantern recently filed suit in Fayette Circuit Court against the University of Kentucky after it refused to release emails surrounding the $375,000 separation payment to a UK professor who had requested emails about her case. The agreement stipulated she withdraw her request for the emails, which the Lantern later requested. UK also used the “preliminary” argument to deny emails were subject to open records.

Republican Attorney General Russell Coleman upheld UK’s refusal.

“UK paid almost $400,000 to a professor that had won an open records appeal against it and made the payment contingent on her dropping her request for records. The public has a right to know what the university was willing to pay so dearly to hide,” Abate told the Lantern.

“On top of that, the attorney general’s decision attempts to re-write the narrow exemption for ‘preliminary’ records to include virtually any email or other ‘non-final’ document possessed by an agency,” he continued. “That interpretation, if accepted, would gut the Open Records Act and render most of the documents now accessible to the public off-limits.”

“Not just journalists, but everyone, has an important stake in keeping public institutions and officials open to public scrutiny,” said Jamie Lucke, the editor of the Kentucky Lantern. “And yet we keep seeing a widespread and bipartisan desire for secrecy among our Kentucky officials. That’s why we have to keep defending transparency and the open government laws that have served Kentucky well for more than 50 years.”

The Kentucky Open Government Coalition, a nonprofit devoted to government transparency, is also fighting for our rights in court. In September, the Kentucky Supreme Court heard arguments from the coalition — also represented by Abate — that government business conducted via private cell phones was still subject to open records requests.

The case revolves around a 2021 open records request denied by the Department of Fish and Wildlife for text and email communications on private accounts that discussed official business.

The state Court of Appeals ruled against the department, stating the obvious: excluding text messages on private phones “would surely operate to encourage the use of personal electronic devices and place vital public records beyond the reach of citizens.”

To the average citizen, these cases can seem dull and complicated. But they are at the heart of this place we call the United States, which as President Abraham Lincoln famously extolled in the Gettysburg Address, is “government of the people, by the people, for the people.”

This concept seems to be too often forgotten by the people we elect to office, whose jobs would be made easier at every turn if they didn’t have some responsibility to the voters.

These court battles are a reminder of who they work for and what is at stake.

This story was originally published January 6, 2026 at 11:14 AM.