Sure it can.

Journalists have a very bizarre understanding of how FOIA requests work. It's not like some government worker can just pull files from a computer server while they're at home. It frequently involves digging into boxes (actual, physical boxes) of documents in the office, interacting with other employees in other departments covered by the request, and a fair amount of review in closed quarters on government facilities since many of the documents can't be removed from the office until they're reviewed.

And the time spent responding to an FOIA request is time not spent doing their normal job (except for the rare agencies which have the budget to have a dedicated FOIA responder).