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When President Barack Obama speaks today at an Open Government Partnership event at the United Nations General Assembly, he will do so as head of an administration criticized at home for its lack of openness.

This is the most restrictive and most message controlling, most manipulative and often hostile than Ive seen since the Nixon administration, said Len Downie, former Washington Post executive editor and now a professor at Arizona State Universitys Walter Cronkite School of Journalism.

Obama pledged to have the most open and transparent administration in history when he was inaugurated as president in 2009. The reality hasnt met his promise, according to groups that measure government transparency.

The administration has conducted a record number of leak investigations of federal employees and contractors accused of leaking classified information to journalists. It has jailed more whistle-blowers under espionage laws than all previous administrations combined.

New York Times reporter James Risen is facing testimony or jail time in a federal case involving a former Central Intelligence Agency officer charged with leaking information to him. Earlier this month, a U.S. appeals court sent the case back to federal district court.

Last year, the Justice Department revealed it had secretly accessed phone records of Associated Press journalists. A Washington Post column published today brought attention to White House meddling in reports written by reporters in the media pool that follows the president.

The open government meeting today is being led by Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto and Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. Obama, at the UN general assembly this week, has been focused on Middle East unrest and reining in the Ebola outbreak in Africa.

The White House declined today to give any preview of what the president would say at the meeting.

Reporters Without Borders this year rated both Mexico and Indonesia difficult, the second to worst rating, in its annual press freedom report. The U.S. scored satisfactory, below the top level of good, earned by countries including Canada and all the Scandinavian nations.

Led by the Society of Professional Journalists, journalism and open government groups in July sent a letter to Obama detailing what they said is politically driven suppression of news and information about federal agencies.

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Obama, Criticized in U.S., Promotes Open Government