Citizens Against Government Waste President Thomas Schatz presented Grassley with the Taxpayer Super Hero award on Thursday, July 30, 2015.
Grassley Named a "Taxpayer Super Hero"
WASHINGTON?Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa today received the designation of "Taxpayer Super Hero" from the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste. The title is awarded to lawmakers who earned a score of 100 percent in the council's 2014 Congressional Ratings.
"I appreciate receiving this award from an organization that works to cut wasteful government spending and make the government more accountable to taxpayers. This has been a priority of mine for a long time. We don't have a taxing problem. Washington has a spending problem," Grassley said.
"We applaud and wholeheartedly thank Sen. Grassley for his hard work on behalf of the taxpayers while serving in the Senate. His courageous votes to cut wasteful spending and make government more accountable should serve as an example to other members, encouraging them to make good on promises to protect the fiscal interests of American taxpayers. His constituents should be very proud of him," said Council for Citizens Against Government Waste President Tom Schatz.
The 2014 report scored 13 votes in the U.S. Senate and identified members whose voting records helped protect and save the taxpayers' money.
As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and former chairman and a senior member of the Finance Committee, Grassley conducts proactive and ongoing oversight of the federal bureaucracy to protect taxpayers from waste, fraud and abuse. He is the author of the qui tam amendments to the False Claims Act that recovered nearly $3 billion for the taxpayers in fiscal 2014 alone. Grassley is also the founder and chairman of the Whistleblower Protection Caucus, which works to respond to the needs of citizens who play a vital role in protecting against fraud, waste and misconduct. The caucus also works to educate members of the Senate about whistleblower issues.
The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste advocates for the elimination of waste and inefficiency in government.
-30-Prepared Statement by Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa, Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee
On National Whistleblower Appreciation Day
July 30, 2015
I am honored to share the podium with so many friends like Fred [Whitehurst], and my colleagues on the Whistleblower Protection Caucus. I'm also very happy to join them in showing my appreciation for whistleblowers. Whistleblowers often don't get much appreciation or hear many kind words. In fact, Whistleblowers are called all sorts of things. Trust me, I've heard them all.
A lot of folks dismiss whistleblowers for not being "team players." They won't just "go along to get along." They're called disgruntled, selfish, insubordinate, and disrespectful of authority and the chain of command.
Critics throw around these words as if they automatically undermine a whistleblower's claim. Well, it doesn't take a rocket scientist?or even a lawyer?to see how short-sighted that is. The folks pointing fingers at whistleblowers are often the ones responsible for the wrongdoing whistleblowers report.
They are also the most likely sources of retaliation.
We passed the Whistleblower Protection Act over a quarter of a century ago, and employers still use all kinds of tricks to retaliate against whistleblowers.
Managers drum up bogus retaliatory investigations against whistleblowers, demote them, fire them, and ruin their reputations. Some of the latest tricks are pretty sneaky. My Committee is investigating the FBI's use of Loss of Effectiveness orders to retaliate against employees who report sex discrimination. Before my Committee investigated these orders, the FBI kept them secret from employees, and employees had no opportunity to appeal them.
U.S. Marshals Service whistleblowers tell me that managers threaten to use the Freedom of Information Act to learn who has reported wrongdoing or talked to the Inspector General. Then they retaliate against those whistleblowers. This behavior creates an environment of fear, it chills protected speech, and it perverts the Freedom of Information Act.
However, experience shows us that silencing whistleblowers just allows wrongdoing to fester and spread.
By pointing out problems, whistleblowers foster transparency and make it possible for their organizations to do better. After all, you can't fix something if you don't know it's broken. That's just common sense.
Many whistleblowers bravely report their concerns internally to their supervisors before they even think of themselves as whistleblowers. They expect that their organization will take corrective action. But many employers don't listen. Then they discover they could have saved a lot of time, money, and embarrassment by taking a whistleblower seriously.
Fred Whitehurst's case is a great example. In the 1990s, Fred wrote hundreds of letters reporting serious flaws in forensic analysis at the FBI Crime Lab. He was subjected to personal attacks, retaliatory investigations, and suspension. But a 1997 Inspector General Report validated his claims. The report said that examiners did shoddy work that led to inaccurate testimony in criminal cases. Then the FBI and Justice Department failed to adequately review the examiners' flawed analysis or inform defendants of evidence that could clear their names. According to the Inspector General, that failure led to "irreversible harm" for many defendants.
Twenty years after Fred first blew the whistle, the agency finally admitted its mistakes. According to the FBI, the examiners gave flawed testimony about 90 percent of the time, including in death penalty cases. This is what happens when organizations treat whistleblowers as liabilities instead of assets.
Experience also shows us that we need to protect whistleblowers who use lawful external channels to report waste, fraud, and abuse. One example of this is the False Claims Act. Before I co-authored amendments to the Act in 1986, much of the outrageous fraud in government contracting went undetected and unprosecuted. Since the amendments, which empowered and protected whistleblowers, false claims suits have recouped over 40 billion dollars in taxpayer funds.
Another example is congressional oversight. Whistleblowers help Congress ensure the laws we pass work the way they are supposed to. Without whistleblowers, we might never have known about gun walking in Operation Fast and Furious, the mismanagement of the juvenile justice programs, or the misuse of the EB-5 investor visa program. Whistleblower disclosures like these help bring greater transparency, better legislation and better government.
No one can dispute that we need whistleblowers. So why do I still get calls every day with fresh stories about reprisals for reporting wrongdoing? Part of the problem is that there is still much legislative work to be done.
For example, the law does not protect FBI whistleblowers who report wrongdoing to their supervisors. These are things that Congress can work on.
Unfortunately, no amount of legislation will change a culture that punishes whistleblowers. To be effective, laws have to be enforced, and wrongdoers have to be held accountable. With their words and actions, leaders have to make clear that whistleblowers are important and retaliation is not tolerated.
For many years I've asked the President of the United States to have a Rose Garden ceremony honoring whistleblowers. After all, the tone at the top is critical. The President has never taken my suggestion. However, my colleagues in the Senate have joined me in setting the right tone here in Congress with the Whistleblower Protection Caucus. It has 12 members, with an equal number from each side of the aisle. Whatever their party affiliation, my colleagues on the Caucus agree with me that whistleblowers should be valued, not punished.
That is why I am here today, to show my appreciation. The first whistleblower I ever met, Ernie Fitzgerald, once told me that the only thing whistleblowers are guilty of is "committing truth." Like Ernie, many of you here have risked your career, your personal well-being, and your reputation by "committing truth." You have shined a light on fraud and unlawful activity, saved taxpayer money, and helped us in Congress write better laws. You have a made a difference.
Video can be found here.
Whistleblower Appreciation Day
Government employees are entrusted with the responsibility of serving the people of this country. Most of these employees take their work very seriously.
Unfortunately, though, too often, I've seen fraud, waste and abuse derail the work of a federal agency, and tarnish the good work that its employees do for the American people.
I'm always encouraged, though, by the brave employees who come forward to bring to light misconduct and malpractice. These whistleblowers uphold the public trust by taking the first step to correct the problem.
Whistleblowers are often treated like skunks at a picnic by their co-workers or bosses for exposing misconduct, even though it brings important accountability to government.
As we celebrate Whistleblower Appreciation Day this week. It's time to say thank you to those who have risked their careers to bring about a better quality of government. It's also a time to renew our commitment to encouraging others to speak out against fraud, waste, and abuse.
Because of the patriotic work of whistleblowers, our government is more accountable to the people.
Thank you.
Grassley Raises Concerns about Handling of Classified Material
WASHINGTON - Senator Chuck Grassley, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, is raising concerns with the executive branch's handling of classified information that is known to be out of the control of the federal government.
"It's a serious breach of national security if the United States government fails to secure classified material in the hands of people not authorized to possess it, no matter who they are. There are fundamental questions as to what the FBI is doing to securing these classified emails and why the State Department is not fully cooperating with the inspectors general at the State Department and the Intelligence Community to ensure that all of the appropriate emails are identified," Grassley said. "It's important to make sure that politics aren't taking precedence over national security."
In a letter to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Grassley asked Director James Comey to explain what the Bureau is doing to ensure that classified information within 30,000 Clinton emails known to be on a thumb drive of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's personal attorney, David Kendall, is secured and not further disseminated.
Grassley subsequently sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry asking why the agency isn't providing the State Department and Intelligence Community inspectors general with full access to the 30,000 Clinton emails. In the letter Grassley wrote that, "The State Department's refusal to fully cooperate in this matter is extremely troubling given the risk that national security information is not being adequately protected."
A copy of the text of Grassley's letters to the FBI and the State Department are below. A copy of the text of Grassley's letters to the FBI and the State Department are below. A signed copy of the FBI letter can be found here and the State Department letter can be found here
