On March 29, 2004, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Robert Schnider ruled that several of the Ryans' custody records should be opened to the public. The following week, on April 2, 2004, Barack Obama called on Democrats not to inject them into the campaign. The Ryan campaign characterized Obama's stance as hypocritical because people they alleged to be Obama's backers had been emailing reports about the divorce records before Judge Schnider's decision and urging the press to seek to open them.