White House Sought to Weaken Whistleblower Protections for National Security Employees

In a conscious decision, the White House worked against the interests of national security whistleblowers, diluting their current protections in legislation that just passed a Senate committee, according to this article in the Washington Times. FBI employees and other national security whistleblowers will have less access to jury trials if they blow the whistle. E-mails from the White House Counsels office indicate the hesitancy the executive branch has about granting full whistleblower rights to all federal employees. The language from the White House is similar to that which ended up in the bill that came out of a committee in the Senate last week. From the article:

Whistleblower groups said they were disappointed by the White House changes.

Tom Devine, legislative director for the Government Accountability Project, said the White House changes created obstacles that could stymie national security whistleblowers, such as a new review panel to hear complaints from intelligence employees who bring allegations of wrongdoing to light.

"In reality, it just changes the drapes and the window dressing. All the hearings would still be conducted by the agencies," Mr. Devine said.

But, there is still time to fix this problem:

The Government Accountability Project's Mr. Devine said he supported other measures backed by the Obama administration, and said there's still time to extend protections to national security workers because House and Senate negotiators have yet to work out a final bill.

It should be noted, that although the Senate bill is not perfect, the majority of federal whistleblowers would have increased access to jury trials and greater overall protections.

Comments

[Sylvia Kieding]

I am not up to date on this bill, but I need to look at the definition of national security employees because I immediately thought of the Department of Energy and its stress on security. I hope those workers are protected.