National Security Whistleblowers Coalition - In a letter sent today the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition, together with a Consortium of over one hundred whistleblowers and organizations, urged Congressman Duncan Hunter, Chairman of the House Committee on Armed Services, to support house substitute for an ineffective Senate Amendment which will not protect national security during the final conference on the 2007 Defense Authorization Act. (To review the letter Click here.)

“After 9/11, the need to effectively protect federal employee whistleblowers is obvious. We cannot afford a repeat of the mistakes that led to 9/11. It is simply intolerable that federal employee whistleblowers have less whistleblower protection then almost every other employee in the United States. A cop on the beat in New Jersey who complained about enforcement of Jaywalking laws had radically more whistleblower protections than an FBI agent complaining that a 9/11 hijacker illegally entered the United States. Congress must act now to protect all American’s from waste, fraud, abuse and security violations,” said Stephen M. Kohn, the President of the National Whistleblower Center and a leading expert on whistleblower laws.

The Senate has incorporated a whistleblower protection provision (S.494) into the fiscal year 2007 defense authorization act. The Senate proposal does not properly protect national security. It excludes key government workers, including employees of the FBI and CIA, from any whistleblower protection whatsoever. According to Kohn, “the Senate proposal is so weak that a federal employee complaining about the illegal entry of one of the 9/11 hijackers into the United States would have radically less protection under federal law than a truck driver complaining about the amount of air in his tires. Unlike S.494, the House version, H.R. 5112, will protect federal employees and needs to be immediately substituted into the conference and enacted into federal law.”

Bill Weaver, NSWBC Senior Advisor, stated: “What is needed is a complete overhaul of whistleblower protection, not a Frankenstein of appendages meant to correct problems that are in fact irreparable within the confines of existing legislation.”

The House Government Reform Committee has conducted extensive hearings on the appropriate standards necessary to protect those patriotic civil servants willing to expose bureaucrats or politicians who are “weak” or incompetent on national-security issues. The Committee has taken leadership on drafting and passing real whistleblower protections intended to defend national security; H.R. 5112.

It is not too dramatic to say that if the provisions in the Senate bill pass, rather than the genuine protections contemplated in the house bill, Congress will have sentenced as-yet unknown Americans to death and injury by failing to protect proven measures – reporting of government malfeasance and negligence – that gird our national security.

The Coalition requested Chairman Hunter’s personal intervention to ensure that the protections offered under HR. 5112 are adopted in conference, not the weak and completely ineffective Senate provision, S. 494, during the final conference on the 2007 Defense Authorization Act.

Signatories:

Bergman, Bill, Financial Market Analyst, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago

Bigelow, Steve, Retired Air Force Lieutenant Colonel, Joint Chiefs of Staff, J-33

Bittler, Thomas, Training Coordinator, TSA-DHS

Black, P. Jeffrey, Federal Air Marshal (FAMS), TSA/DHS

Bonnette, James., Sr., District Adjudications Officer, Citizenship and Immigration Services-DHS

Brown, James R., Former Operations Officer, Senior CI-HUMINT Investigator, Department of Army

Carman, John, Former Senior Inspector, U.S. Customs

Carpenter, Shawn, Member of Technical Staff, Sandia National Laboratories

Chudson, Jonathan, Former Special Agents, IG-Office, EPA

Cleary, Kevin J., Senior Special Agent, U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security/ICE & U.S. Customs Service (O.I)

Cole, John M., Former Veteran Intelligence Operations Specialist, FBI

Conrad, David “Mark”, Retired Agent in Charge, Internal Affairs, U.S. Customs

Connolly, Frank, Aviation Security Inspector, TSA

Copley, James, Project Manager, DOE

Cruse, Larry, Army Intelligence Analyst, DOD,

Davidson, Kathaleen, Nuclear Security Training Coordinator, Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station

Dzakovic, Bogdan, Former Red Team Leader, FAA

Edmonds, Sibel, Former Language Specialist, FBI

Ellsberg, Dan, Former Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary of Defense (ISA), DOD

Elson, Steve, Veteran Agent, FAA

Fei, Christopher, Former Mail Room Clerk Contractor, Army Corp of Engineers

Forbes, David, Aviation, Logistics and Govt. Security Analysts

Gonzalez, Sandalio, Retired Federal Agent, DEA

Goodman, Melvin A., Former Senior Analyst/ Division Manager, CIA; Senior Fellow at the Center for International Policy,

Guagliardi, Ray, training coordinator, TSA-DHS

Hirsch, Daniel M., Foreign Service Officer, U.S. Department of State

Hnatio, John, Former International Program Manager, DNN, NNSA & DOE

Jenkins, Steve, Intelligence Analyst, NGIC, US Army

Johnson, Larry, Deputy Director- Counterterrorism, Department of State; Analyst, CIA

Kwiatkowski, Karen U., Lt. Col. USAF (ret.), Veteran Policy Analyst-DOD

Lau, Lok, Former Special Agent, Counterintelligence, FBI

Levine, Michael, Retired Supervisory Special Agent/Covert Operations Specialist, DEA

Lipsky, John, Supervisory Special Agent, FBI

MacLean, Robert, Federal Air Marshal Service, TSA-DHS

Mansour, Joe, Occupational Safety Specialist, Federal Bureau of Prison

MacMichael, David, Former Senior Estimates Officer, CIA

Maschke, George W., Former Intelligence Officer, U.S. Army Reserve

McCullers, Shawn B., Federal Air Marshal (FAMS), TSA/DHS

McGovern, Raymond L., Former Analyst, CIA

McInerney, Cullen, Supervisory Special Agent, Joint Terrorism Task Force, Federal Air Marshal Service, DHS

Nowacki, Michael, Former Staff Sergeant, Military Intelligence, United States Army

Nunn, Sandy, Former Special Agent, US Customs

O’Neill, Michael J., Retired, USAF, Technical Sergeant, Command and Control Supervisor; former Screening (Operations) Manager, TSA-DHS

Pahle, Theodore J., Senior Intelligence Officer (Ret), DIA

Price, Paul, Language Analyst, NSA

Puello, Franklin, Former Supervisor for Transportation Security Screeners, TSA-DHS

Reinbold, Thomas G., retired Lt. Commander, Naval Security Group-Office of Naval Intelligence; Retired Senior Cryptologic Engineer, NSA

Rempfer, Thomas L., Major (Current)

Robinson, Dr. Lonnie, Agricultural Specialist, U.S. Customs Service, DHS

Russell, William H., Computer Specialist, R & E Division, NSA

Sarshar, Behrooz, Retired Language Specialist, FBI

Savich, William, Special Agent, Bureau of Diplomatic Security, U.S. State Department

Schott, Suzanne Grace, Former Screening Supervisor, TSA-DHS

Springmann, Mike, Foreign Service Officer-5; Second Secretary & Vice Consul, Department of State

Starns, Robert, Special Agent in Charge, Diplomatic Security Service, Department of State

Stella V., Marie, Retired Lead Information System Security Officer, FAA,

Stroup, Jay, Former Federal Security Director, TSA

Sullivan, Brian, Special Agent, Risk Program Management Specialist, FAA

Tice, Russ, Senior Intelligence Analyst & Action Officer, NSA

Tortorich, Larry J., Retired Naval Officer, US Navy & Dept. of Homeland Security/TSA,

Turner, Jane, Veteran Special Agent, FBI

Vincent, John, Veteran Special Agent, Counterterrorism, FBI

Walp, Glenn, PhD, Former Office Leader of the Office of Security Inquiries, Los Alamos National Lab, DOE

Woo, Robert, Special Agent, Counterintelligence, FBI

Wright, Robert, Veteran Special agent, Counterterrorism, FBI

Sibel D. Edmonds; Director-NSWBC

Stephen Kohn; Chairperson-National Whistleblower Center

Michael Ostrolenk; Director-Liberty Coalition

Sandalio Gonzalez; National President-FHLEOA

www.fhleoa.org

Dr. Jeffrey Fudin; President-VAWBC

Daniel Hirsch; Board Member-CFSO

Matthew Fogg; Executive Director-Congress against Racism & Corruption in Law Enforcement

Dane Von Breichenruchardt- President; US Bill of Rights Foundation