by Louis Clark, GAP President

Eight years ago, a handful of pipefitters raised a critical safety problem. Their bosses at the Hanford nuclear weapons facility ordered them to install and then test inadequate valves in pipes intended to carry high-level radioactive waste. The pipefitters cited worker and public health concerns when refusing to obey orders, but were again told to comply -- with an added threat of termination if they did not do so. They stood their ground and lost their jobs, setting off an eight-year battle for vindication.

That exoneration occurred on September 2, 2005. A unanimous Washington state jury submitted its findings after an extraordinary, unprecedented six-week trial. It awarded eleven workers nearly $5 million in back pay and damages. The Department of Energy (DOE) contractor Fluor Federal Services, which had unceremoniously dumped the workers, was stunned. It had spent more than an estimated $3 million of U.S. taxpayer dollars in corporate legal fees to keep the case from reaching the courthouse.

Those who attended the trial were not surprised by the verdict. While a dozen corporate lawyers challenged and objected as the evidence of illegal reprisal and open hostility toward whistleblowers mounted, one lone attorney for the workers demolished the defenses of the contractor, along with the credibility of its bosses and other witnesses. By the end of the trial, the verdict seemed to be almost a foregone conclusion, although the level of damages awarded was a pleasant surprise to the workers and their public interest supporters.

There were other less dramatic victories along the way toward the ultimate jury decision. Years earlier, DOE had agreed that the workers were right not to install the inadequate, dangerous valves. It had even ordered its government contractor to reinstate the workers, which the company did temporarily until it manufactured another excuse to fire them.

The workers had even offered to mediate their differences through a special council for whistleblower concerns. Fluor opted for scorched-earth legal warfare. DOE backed up its contractor with a blank check on legal costs. In doing so, the department had not counted on growing unease in Congress as members saw the price tag mushroom.

Seven weeks before the jury delivered the pipefitters’ absolution, Congress stripped the DOE of much of its authority to pay the legal bills of its contractors against whistleblower lawsuits. The experiences and story of these whistleblowers played a pivotal role in prompting congressional action.

The pipefitters’ refusal to be responsible for possible injury or death to other workers, as well as their fierce determination to have their day in court, has changed the legal rules for whistleblowers nationwide. No longer can major contractors rely on the bottomless pit of the federal treasury to fund their vindictiveness.

As for the federal government -- this is the time to stand up for the workers who refuse to remain silent in the face of public safety, instead of greasing the palms of corporate lawyers. In fact, companies that put production quotas above human life require punishment, not financial reward and unlimited legal fees.

by Dylan Blaylock, GAP Communications Director, and Coleen Rowley, retired FBI agent and whistleblower

Even as the public focuses on President Bush’s most recent Supreme Court nomination, the business of the court goes on. And this week, it will take up a First Amendment case, Garcetti v. Ceballos, that is crucial not only to government workers across the country, but to all Americans concerned about free speech and national security.

While a deputy district attorney in Los Angeles County, Richard Ceballos investigated allegations of police misconduct in a case his office was prosecuting. After finding evidence suggesting that a deputy sheriff might have lied in order to obtain a search warrant, Mr. Ceballos drafted a memo to supervisors detailing the wrongdoing and recommending that they drop the case. After supervisors proceeded with the prosecution, Mr. Ceballos informed the defense of his findings, as required by law. He was subsequently removed from the prosecution’s team, demoted and transferred to a different office.

Mr. Ceballos filed suit claiming that he was retaliated against in violation of his rights. His boss, District Attorney Gil Garcetti, and the California State Association of Counties argued that free speech protection only extends to public employees when an employee expresses his personal opinions - those being what he advocates as a citizen, rather than an employee. After the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, ruled in favor of Mr. Ceballos, his opponents pushed for the nation’s highest court to take the case.

Should the First Amendment protect a public employee’s purely job-related speech? The answer will affect the rights of millions of public employees, from police officers to public hospital workers. And in particular, the principle decided here will dictate how whistleblowers are treated in government offices where the reporting of mismanagement and fraud are vital to our country’s well-being, places like intelligence agencies, the Department of Energy and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Presidential administrations seem more often than not to make loyalty paramount. While loyalty in marriage, family and among friends is the glue that binds society, government employees owe their ultimate allegiance not to their supervisor or president but to America: its Constitution, laws and citizens.

The Standards of Ethical Conduct for Employees of the Executive Branch, regulations by which all federal workers are required to abide, clearly state that employees "shall disclose waste, fraud, abuse and corruption to appropriate authorities."

But no law effectively protects federal workers who report malfeasance as part of their job duties. And coverage of state workers is patchy. As a result, those workers we depend on for our safety have often faced a terrible conundrum: either remain quiet and allow fraud and wrongdoing to occur, or speak out and risk retaliation. When one of us (Ms. Rowley) spoke out about the F.B.I.’s pre-9/11 lapses, it was likely only the leaking of her memo to the press that saved her from professional retaliation.

For hundreds of other nameless government truth tellers who tried to work solely within the system, however, there has been no such happy ending. Instead, they have been left with the incongruity noted by the appeals court judge who ruled in favor of Mr. Ceballos: that while they might be protected if they took their problem to the press, they would not be protected if they tried to remedy the problem within the system.

With so much at stake in national security, is that a situation we want to let stand? A ruling against First Amendment rights would muzzle those who know security issues better than any oversight body officials can hope to create. We cannot rely solely on Congress to keep tabs on absolutely everything happening under them - such a task is impossible.

Supported by the Bush administration, lawyers for Mr. Garcetti and the California counties association are rehashing arguments that government managers have always used against granting these protections to employees - namely that providing these rights might lead to management paralysis and a deluge of litigation. But the Supreme Court in the past has dismissed these unfounded predictions, realizing that our court system is equipped to weed out frivolous lawsuits. These managers should be praising an early warning system that detects problems and maintains departmental integrity.

Now the court has a chance to clarify previous legal precedents and set the record straight. America should be encouraging those civil servants who step forward to make our country stronger. Cutting off protection is a recipe for disasters of mass proportions.

by Louis Clark, GAP President. This editorial also appeared in the Topeka Capital-Journal, Star-Democrat (MD), and Brinkley Argus (AR).

Earlier this year, it was revealed that Philip Cooney, chief of staff for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, repeatedly edited scientific reports to downplay human impact on climate change. In his role, Cooney edited hundreds of pages in multiple reports to advance Bush administration views, effectively making the science fit the policy. In one example, Cooney deleted an entire paragraph discussing the projected reduction of mountain glaciers, noting in the margins that the language was "straying from research strategy into speculative findings/musings."

Why would an educated man in an enlightened society edit a scientific report in such a policy-driven way? One reason may be that Cooney is a lawyer with no scientific background. Even more egregious, Cooney was employed previously as a lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute, the preeminent oil industry interest group in Washington, D.C. After the scandal was uncovered, Cooney resigned his post, only to be hired by ExxonMobil three days later.

Cooney and the administration display a unique arrogance in this matter. As a free society, we cannot allow attempts to skew, censor or falsify scientific evidence for personal or political agendas. This constitutes scientific fraud. If the executive branch has such a strong aversion to the concept that SUV emissions and burning fossil fuels cause global warming, then they should fund scientific studies to investigate further. Crossing out paragraphs and rewording phrases in secrecy for corporate gain is wrong and appalling. An oil lobbyist who serves his former master should never be given the power to exercise prior restraint when dealing with science.

Fortunately, the administration was outed in this incident. But the scandal suggests a deeper sickness in certain quarters of this government in the approach to science. A disagreement over economic or ethical implications of scientific results certainly has its place, but scientific findings must be shielded, impervious to opinion, political persuasion or ideology.

Cooney’s arrogance has infuriated numerous government officials, including Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.). Both have written to ExxonMobil, shaming it for hiring a man who so brashly betrayed the public trust. Some lawmakers have gone a step further, introducing a bill that would make the politicization of scientific research illegal. This law would effectively grant whistleblower protection for federal scientists who refuse to rewrite their studies for improper reasons, along with making it illegal for agency officials to force scientists to rewrite findings.

Galileo proclaimed to the world that the earth revolved around the sun, and the ethical objections and criticisms he faced made it no less true. In suppressing Galileo’s views, his government deterred the progress of all humanity. Let us keep the lessons of the past in mind as we encounter those who lie about, mold and craft scientific findings. We can be assured that history will not look kindly upon Cooney. His actions were wildly undemocratic and against society’s better interests. We need science to tell us the truth about our world as it finds it. We need those answers unfiltered and uncensored.

by Melanie Beth Oliviero, GAP International Program Director. This editorial also appeared in: Topeka Capital-Journal, Garden City Telegram (KS), and Worthington Daily Globe (MN).

Paul Wolfowitz’s selection as World Bank president has highlighted ongoing problems at that multi-billion dollar institution. The new boss’s plate is certainly full as the Bank’s poverty-reducing programs fail routinely under mass criticism. African AIDS rates continue to rise sharply, and the Bank’s characteristically slow responses to major issues are constantly under fire and heavy scrutiny. In addition to tackling these problems, Wolfowitz has faced scores of claims that question his motives for assuming command – namely that the Bush administration seek to use the Bank as a puppet for pushing American interests.

But Wolfowitz can surely handle any media scrutiny directed toward him. What he need concern himself with are the 11,000 Bank employees. They predominantly opposed his selection. Within one week of the new boss’s nomination, the Bank received over 1,300 messages from staff about the choice, 87 percent opposed. Reasons cited included security concerns, possible effects on the Bank’s reputation, and a future lack of independence from U.S. policies. Former Bank president James Wolfensohn, though he praised Wolfowitz’s skills in public, often subtly hinted at his disapproval of the choice. In May, Wolfensohn stated that the Bank selection process should be based on merit, as opposed to the current system in which nomination power rests solely with America.

Over the past decade, allegation after allegation about incompetence, abuse and malfeasance by Bank management have surfaced, only to be met with severe reprisal. Threats, demotions and firings are commonplace as the internal structure safeguards all high-level officers. A simple solution exists for Wolfowitz to quell these criticisms of both himself and the Bank’s programs – the immediate implementation of whistleblower protection.

Transparency and accountability are the key components for credibility, yet the Bank lacks both. Does a legitimate reason exist why Bank staff is barred from speaking with oversight officials in Congress or the Department of Treasury? It is impossible for Wolfowitz to gain the trust of his staff if they are muzzled.

Employees see the Bank’s Department of Institutional Integrity, created to investigate allegations of misconduct, as a tool of management primarily concerned with stifling claimants to avoid bad press. Even more frustrating, a good model for reporting problems – independent of management – currently exists in the Bank’s Inspection Panel. This panel takes complaints from a project’s community members to the Board of Directors, by passing any management interference. In a simple sense, cutting out the middleman has led to tremendous results. All Wolfowitz needs to do is apply this same principle of accountability to all Bank policies, and employee speech protection will be the new law of the land.

The United Nations, entrenched in its own scandals, is quickly learning that creating proper vehicles for workers to raise concerns is not only socially responsible, but fiscally prudent. A new Bank administration has the power to open the door to the world’s taxpayers and the creditors who support it. Who knows what future scandals may be avoided with these changes?

It is impossible to achieve the mission of fighting poverty and improving the living standards of the developing world without the full support of staff. People may disagree with the boss’s ideology, but if a truly effective system for protecting whistleblowers is adopted, criticism of both Wolfowitz and Bank practices will soften.

by Tom Carpenter, GAP Nuclear Oversight Program Director

The Government Accountability Project recently released a report detailing new evidence of contamination in the area around the Hanford nuclear site. New findings included that Columbia River fish and clam samples are contaminated with plutonium, mulberry trees are higher in toxicity than previously thought and radioactive attic dust in the Richland area suggests widespread exposure.

Plutonium content is one of the most troubling findings. The government does not report finding plutonium in fish or clams because, unbelievably, they don’t bother to check. Even more troubling, many individuals, specifically those of the Native American tribes around the Hanford region, are eating these fish, unaware of the potential hazards.

If it seems to you that someone should have been monitoring these contaminants since the get-go and warn unknowing citizens about dangers, you’re right. The Department of Energy and its organizational predecessors have overseen Hanford operations since its inception as a secret plutonium processing plant. Over the years, however, DOE has consistently shown it’s not interested in protecting public health for the people of Washington and Oregon as much as they are in protecting themselves from embarrassing disclosures.

To illustrate this point, just look at DOE behavior over the past five years. An act of Congress was needed to provide health care and financial compensation to workers made ill by radioactive and chemical material exposure, as DOE fights nearly every claim for such illnesses. That’s despite overwhelming medical evidence showing links to cancer. DOE has consistently reneged on its cleanup commitments at Hanford, shrinking the scope of the cleanup program as it announces that it intends to bury tens of thousands of truckloads of waste from other states. Washington state has even been compelled to file lawsuits aimed at forcing DOE to keep the cleanup on schedule.

In keeping with this spirit of offensive behavior, DOE changed its reaction to our report several times over the course of 24 hours. Initially, representatives responded favorably to GAP’s findings, stating they encouraged outside groups to produce independent samplings. This quickly shifted, rather dramatically, to criticizing the report for not being peer-reviewed (an incorrect assertion, as a former Hanford scientist did this). DOE even implied that the plutonium levels in the fish were at acceptable levels. Lastly, DOE attacked GAP as being an anti-nuclear group with a political agenda, pulling the old trick of attacking the messenger.

If being an "anti-nuclear group" means to be concerned about contamination in communities and the food chain, especially when people are not being informed about hazards, so be it. However, our agenda is public safety and accountability. And the people of the Northwest will never receive either one if DOE is in charge of reviewing itself.

There needs to be a credible assessment of just how contaminated the Columbia River has become from Hanford’s past and present emissions, as well as an inventory of the ecological damage, by an independent reviewer. The annual "Hanford State of the Site" meeting produced more than enough examples of individuals whose valid claims seems to be a shock to the Hanford brass, despite these issues coming up year after year.

The people of Washington and Oregon unknowingly sacrificed for their country when the Hanford plant was built, and they continue to suffer today. It is insulting for DOE not to take proactive steps to protect our citizens, much less have to be forced into action. Our congressional representatives should ensure an independent investigation and assessment, providing citizens, tribal members and state agencies with the information they need to protect themselves.

by Louis Clark, GAP President

"Deep Throat" exposed a deep criminal conspiracy. For reasons that remain cloudy, the president periodically sent out a team of former spy operatives to break into the offices of his political enemies, steal documents and tap telephones. The inept gang failed. Once arrested, they refused to talk and accepted large cash payments for their silence. It took two crime beat reporters, guided by FBI whistleblower Mark Felt, to unravel the conspiracy of such key crime figures as the president, the attorney general and FBI director.

As one might expect, many of the original conspirators and their allies have used the recent "outing" of the FBI whistleblower as an opportunity to call him a "traitor." They have speculated that he broke FBI guidelines or regulations, asserting that he was disloyal to his "Commander in Chief." One would expect defensive anger from the hundreds of people who were either a part of, or associated with, the organized crime operation the White House ran involving members of the Cabinet and their subordinates. Unfortunately, others have also questioned Mark Felt’s motives, wondering whether he was angry for having been passed over in the selection of the new chief of the FBI.

This response is troubling, since what we do know about Mark Felt clearly qualifies him for the status of hero. He saved the country from powerful criminal elements, including Felt’s immediate boss who regularly impeded the FBI’s investigation, destroyed evidence, and provided briefings to those who were actively engaged in the Watergate cover-up. The decision to blow the whistle is rarely easy. It requires courage. Whistleblowers often must decide between violating agency gag rules and following their conscience. If they remain anonymous, they are subject to criticism for failing to stand up publicly for principle. They are also at risk for firing without legal recourse, as was Mark Felt who almost lost his job because he was merely suspected of leaking information. On the other hand, if they decide to reveal their identity, many people will speculate that the whistleblower is trying to profit from their revelations.

In his book, "Whistleblowers: Broken Lives and Organizational Power," G. Fred Alford describes how overwhelmingly difficult it is to publicly expose wrongdoing. Most corrupt and problematic situations are far more complex than is easily understood. Whistleblowers are often unsuccessful unless enterprising journalists, such as Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, are willing to invest the time, and publishers the space, to decipher a controversy and raise concerns to the public. Those who oppose whistleblowers often question the motives involved.

In this way, the wrongdoers are attempting a smear campaign aimed at diverting public attention away from the underlying scandal. Since "Deep Throat" cautiously and effectively guided two inexperienced reporters to the truth about their president, there have been thousands of whistleblowers in corporate America, state and local government, and throughout the federal government. We as Americans have come to rely on their messages to learn the truth about illegal practices, unsafe conditions, environmental threats and even national security dangers. These individuals deserve praise and gratitude, not half-baked speculation about what possible dark motives might have inspired them.

Like Watergate, scandals frequently involve hundreds of people who remain silent, giving criminals free reign for their enterprises. Perhaps many who question whistleblowers are actually defending their own silence. After all, if we cannot identify with the whistleblowers, perhaps we feel better when we make the whistleblowers seem flawed. Now that we know who "Deep Throat" is, we should revisit the lessons of Watergate, chief among them being that no person is above the law and evil triumphs when good people say and do nothing. Furthermore, we should come to the aid of these heroes who risk their careers because they provide witness for truth, integrity and accountability. We should honor those on the frontlines of moral conflict who choose to follow their consciences despite the personal peril in doing so.

by Louis Clark, GAP President. This editorial also appeared in the Topeka Capital-Journal

After 9/11, the President called on all Americans to come forward whenever they observe security threats. At every major airport in the nation, there are constant reminders over public address systems to report abandoned parcels and other suspicious activities. In a dictatorship, any such government recruitment of informants is both disquieting and threatening. In a democracy, it is akin to the government sharing responsibility with citizens for the common defense. That’s not unlike national hero Paul Revere’s courageous gallop through the streets of the rebellious colonies to warn of threats on the horizon. National security is the responsibility of every citizen.

Courageous and patriotic whistleblowers have responded to the president’s call to report security vulnerabilities in record numbers. They have raised these up threats as well as abuses of authority and other forms of corruption within their government workplaces, with their superiors at military facilities, to their members of Congress and occasionally, out of frustration, to the media.

As a result our elected officials and we Americans have learned about major problems needing immediate attention. The list is long and includes:

• The torture of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib;
• The vulnerability of nuclear weapons facilities and nuclear power plants to terrorist attack;
• The fudging of antimissile defense testing to hide the fact that it is not possible to tell the difference between decoys and armed missiles;
• The failure of the government to adequately inspect incoming ships and cargoes at our major ports;
• The failure of the FBI before 9/11, because of bureaucratic myopia, to allow its agents to investigate suspicious activity at flight schools;
• Past and current security concerns at not only our ports, but also our borders and airports.

Government studies, congressional hearings, numerous investigations, and presidential commission findings have backed up the whistleblowers on this list of major security deficiencies. Unfortunately, no whistleblower has yet emerged to explain how, despite a massive expenditure of effort and resources, none of the intelligence agencies were able to conclude that Iraq lacked weapons of mass destruction.

Adding up all the key information that we know because of whistleblowers, and considering the intelligence disaster because of a lack of whistleblowers, one comes to one logical conclusion: Whistleblowers are critical for national security. Without them we are not only at risk, we could also be making vital decisions, such as going to war, under false pretenses. As we do with any other true national treasure, we must preserve whistleblowers from harm. The reason none emerged from the ill-fated intelligence meltdown on weapons of mass destruction is simple. Surveys of public employees have reported that there are two primary reasons potential whistleblowers who witness corruption do not step forward. They fear reprisal and secondly, they presume that speaking out is futile because key government officials will not listen or do anything about the identified problem.

Fear of reprisal is justified. Nearly all of the key national security whistleblowers who have come forward since 9/11 were threatened, harassed, disciplined, or fired. Some who saved their careers did so only because powerful members of Congress stepped up and defended them against irate bosses. There are currently no legal whistleblower protections because nearly all of the 15 intelligence agencies are exempt from regular civil service legal protections. But within the regular federal civil service system, those protections have ceased to exist anyway. Not only federal employees, but also all those who care about national security, are victims of a series of administrative decisions that by law cannot be reviewed in any federal court other than the US Supreme Court, which refuses to hear them.

A bipartisan coalition in Congress is determined to act. It recognizes that to preserve national security federal employees must be free to warn about imminent dangers and Congress must remain a viable place to take these warnings. The legislation that is emerging will provide legal protection to federal employees who report to Congress about national security threats. These modern-day "Paul Reveres" must have the right to defend themselves in federal court.