GAP has submitted and is posting comments on the President’s scientific integrity policy. On March 9, the White House announced the draft policy and specified that it should include agency by agency whistleblower policies, for which it requested guidance. GAP’s comments analyze seven core recommendations to:
- Comply with the current Whistleblower Protection Act (WPA) and Anti-Gag Statute by eliminating loopholes in its policies that require prior approval to communicate unclassified information that falls into new hybrid secrecy categories such as “Unclassified But Sensitive”
- Adopt internal whistleblower policies that implement dormant, decade-old recommendations of the Commission on Research Integrity
- Voluntarily adopt additional free speech protections in pending legislation to strengthen the WPA
- Exercise visible leadership by agency chiefs to end the environment of fear
- Eliminate prior restraint for media communications
- Eliminate authority to make changes in the text of published material without the author’s knowledge and approval, and
- Train managers to accept scientific freedom and openness as the operating premise for the workplace environments they supervise.
