U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office

Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800

Fax: (202) 512–2104 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC 20402–0001

42–510 PDF 2009

FBI WHISTLEBLOWERS 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, 

AND HOMELAND SECURITY 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

MAY 21, 2008 

Serial No. 110–154 

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://judiciary.house.gov 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

JOHN CONYERS, JR., Michigan, Chairman 

HOWARD L. BERMAN, California 

RICK BOUCHER, Virginia 

JERROLD NADLER, New York 

ROBERT C. ‘‘BOBBY’’ SCOTT, Virginia 

MELVIN L. WATT, North Carolina 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

MAXINE WATERS, California 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

ROBERT WEXLER, Florida 

LINDA T. SA ́ NCHEZ, California 

STEVE COHEN, Tennessee 

HANK JOHNSON, Georgia 

BETTY SUTTON, Ohio 

LUIS V. GUTIERREZ, Illinois 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

ANTHONY D. WEINER, New York 

ADAM B. SCHIFF, California 

ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama 

DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida 

KEITH ELLISON, Minnesota 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

CHRIS CANNON, Utah 

RIC KELLER, Florida 

DARRELL ISSA, California 

MIKE PENCE, Indiana 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

STEVE KING, Iowa 

TOM FEENEY, Florida 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas 

JIM JORDAN, Ohio 

PERRY APELBAUM, Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

SEAN MCLAUGHLIN, Minority Chief of Staff and General Counsel 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, AND HOMELAND SECURITY

ROBERT C. ‘‘BOBBY’’ SCOTT, Virginia, Chairman 

MAXINE WATERS, California 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

JERROLD NADLER, New York 

HANK JOHNSON, Georgia 

ANTHONY D. WEINER, New York 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

BETTY SUTTON, Ohio 

LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

BOBBY VASSAR, Chief Counsel 

CAROLINE LYNCH, Minority Counsel 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

MAY 21, 2008 

Page 

OPENING STATEMENT 

The Honorable Robert C. ‘‘Bobby’’ Scott, a Representative in Congress from 

the State of Virginia, and Chairman, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, 

and Homeland Security ....................................................................................... 1 

The Honorable Louie Gohmert, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of Texas, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and 

Homeland Security ............................................................................................... 9 

The Honorable John Conyers, Jr., a Representative in Congress from the 

State of Michigan, and Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary ..................... 11 

WITNESSES 

The Honorable Chuck Grassley, a United States Senator from the State 

of Iowa 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 1 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 5 

Mr. Mike German, Policy Counsel, American Civil Liberties Union 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 12 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 15 

Mr. Bassem Youssef, Unit Chief, Communications Analyst Division, Counterterrorism Division, Federal Bureau of Investigation 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 24 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 27 

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

Prepared Statement of the Honorable John Conyers, Jr., a Representative 

in Congress from the State of Michigan, and Chairman, Committee on 

the Judiciary ......................................................................................................... 11 

APPENDIX 

Material Submitted for the Hearing Record .......................................................... 75 

(1) 

FBI WHISTLEBLOWERS 

WEDNESDAY, MAY 21, 2008 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, AND HOMELAND SECURITY

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, Washington, DC. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2 p.m., in room 

2141, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable Robert C. 

‘‘Bobby’’ Scott (Chairman of the Subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Scott, Delahunt, Johnson, and Conyers 

(ex officio), Gohmert, and Lungren. 

Staff Present: Ameer Gopalani, Majority Counsel; Caroline 

Lynch, Minority Counsel; Renata Strause, Majority Staff Assistant; 

and Lillian German, Majority Deputy Chief Oversight Counsel. 

Mr. SCOTT. The Subcommittee will come to order. And I would 

like to welcome you to the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and 

Homeland Security. Today’s subject is FBI Whistleblowers, and I 

will suspend the rest of my opening statement because we understand Senator Grassley’s schedule had assumed that we would 

start on time. Unfortunately, we are a half-hour late. So I will 

defer the rest of my statement, Senator, so that you can make your 

opening statement and attend to your other duties. 

Senator Grassley. 

TESTIMONY OF THE HONORABLE CHUCK GRASSLEY, A 

UNITED STATES SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF IOWA 

Senator GRASSLEY. I have noticed the House has had a lot of toleration toward the Senate moving slowly. So it would be wrong for 

me to come over here and complain about not starting on time. 

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee and particularly my good friend Mr. Conyers, thank you for holding this important hearing today. Listening carefully to what whistleblowers 

have to say and looking into their allegations is a key constitutional duty of all of us in Congress. 

The FBI is one of the most powerful but least transparent organizations in the Federal Government. Underneath of all the good 

things the FBI does—and I want to emphasize good things that 

they do—unfortunately there is a history of abuse, mismanagement, retaliation so strong that it has become part of its organizational culture. Unfortunately, it is this culture that causes the FBI 

to confuse dissent with disloyalty. Only a brave few dare to speak 

2 

out and break the FBI’s code of silence to report problems. When 

they do speak out, they usually suffer retaliation. 

Whistleblowers demonstrate tremendous courage in any organization, but speaking out as an FBI agent takes a special level of 

guts and determination. I have worked with whistleblowers for 

many years, including Dr. Frederick Whitehurst, who came forward to discuss outrageous problems at the FBI crime lab, and 

former Special Agent Colleen Rowley, who came forward to discuss 

the bungled investigation of Zacarias Moussaoui. 

Today you are going to hear testimony from two other FBI whistleblowers who have worked with my office for several years, 

former Special Agent Michael German, and supervisory agent, Special Agent Bassem Youssef. I am here today to let you know why 

I have supported these courageous individuals and can tell you 

that these two men have taken more than their share of abuse. 

They stuck their necks out for the good of all of us. They didn’t 

take the easy way out by going along to get along or looking the 

other way. 

The whistleblower who I call the grandfather of whistleblowers, 

Ernie Fitzgerald of Department of Defense fame, says that whistleblowers are only guilty of one crime, committing truth. Well, that 

is exactly what put a target on the backs of Michael German and 

Bassem Youssef inside the FBI. They had the courage to tell the 

unvarnished truth that some people at the FBI didn’t want to hear, 

and they have paid the price for committing truth. 

Michael German was a 14-year veteran special agent who would 

risk his life by going undercover and successfully infiltrating neoNazi organizations for the FBI. He was asked to help with a Florida case where a neo-Nazi group and a foreign Islamic terrorist 

group appeared to be talking about forging an alliance based upon 

their shared anti-Semitic beliefs. He soon discovered that a portion 

of a meeting between the groups had been illegally recorded by 

mistake. Rather than simply follow the rules, document the errors 

and move forward as German suggested, one FBI supervisor told 

him to, quote, just pretend it didn’t happen. An investigation by 

the Department of Justice Inspector General found that the FBI retaliated against German for refusing to look the other way. The Inspector General even found someone that in the FBI falsified documents in that Florida case, actually using Wite-Out to hide their 

mistakes. 

Yet despite these findings, did the FBI take swift and decisive 

action to hold anyone accountable? Has it done anything whatsoever to correct the problem of the wrongs inflicted on Michael German? The answer to both questions is no. 

Bassem Youssef is the FBI’s highest-ranking Arab American 

agent. Before 9/11 he successfully worked counterterrorism cases 

and served as an effective liaison from the FBI to the Saudi Arabian Government. His background as an Egyptian-born Coptic 

Christian and a native Arabic speaker should have made him one 

of the FBI’s most valued and most appreciated employees, especially after the 9/11 attacks. Yet despite his experience in 

counterterrorism and his cultural expertise, the FBI failed to assign him to positions where those assets would be best used. 

3 

When Youssef expressed concern about the FBI’s practice of putting other less qualified agents into critical counterterrorism positions, he quickly became like most whistleblowers, about as welcome as a skunk at a Sunday school picnic. 

How did the FBI let Youssef know that he wasn’t welcome? Well, 

this is simple. Senior officials denied him a transfer to a 

counterterrorism unit. They placed him in an administrative job 

managing the FBI’s receipt of information from telephone companies. Youssef soon identified major problems with the way his new 

office had been operating before he got there. The FBI had been 

sending something called exigent letters to get phone companies to 

provide phone records to the Bureau. The letters ask phone companies to give the FBI records immediately, claiming that there was 

an emergency and that the grand jury subpoena was being drafted 

and would be sent later. However, no grand jury subpoenas were 

actually drafted, and in many cases, there was no emergency to 

justify their request. The FBI was misusing the system. 

Youssef says that he recognized this and tried to work with others at the FBI to correct them but received little or no cooperation. 

The FBI’s General Counsel’s Office and his superiors at the FBI 

were uninterested in the issues that he raised. The FBI finally 

started trying to deal with the issues Youssef had raised only after 

Congress asked the Inspector General to investigate. 

So Mr. Chairman, you know some of the things you are doing 

today are very important. Yet even after scrutiny from Congress 

and the Inspector General, FBI officials wasted time and energy on 

retaliating against Youssef rather than fixing the problems that he 

brought to their attention. One FBI official said that during his testimony to the Inspector General that he, quote, threw Bassem 

Youssef under the bus, end quote. Another FBI official asked a colleague who was preparing to testify to the Inspector General if he 

was, quote, getting ready to throw Bassem Youssef off the roof. 

These comments confirm that the anti-whistleblower culture at 

the FBI is as strong as ever. Essentially these FBI personnel stated 

openly that they intend to use the Inspector General review as a 

vehicle to retaliate against Youssef. 

In light of these comments, I am very concerned about the Inspector General’s ongoing investigation. I am also concerned because the inquiry is being conducted jointly with the FBI. Conducting an investigation jointly with the organization under review 

seems to me undermines the very independence that an Inspector 

General is supposed to provide. 

When this controversy first began, the Inspector General wanted 

to let the FBI investigate itself and simply the Inspector General 

monitor the results. I thought that position was very wrong-headed. Allegations as serious as these warrant an independent review, 

not an internal FBI probe that might look like a whitewash. 

So I urged the Inspector General to make an independent determination. Now his office is conducting a review. But instead of 

doing it independently, it is being done jointly with the FBI, the 

same organization whose conduct is in question. That bothers me 

a lot, as I imagine it bothers you. 

Given all these circumstances, Congress needs to take a careful 

look at the Inspector General’s report on the use of exigent letters 

4 

when it is finally released. We need to get access to the underlying 

document and ask the tough questions necessary to ensure the reliability and the integrity of the investigation. 

My colleagues and I have been seeking e-mails from the FBI on 

this case for over a year. We are still waiting these e-mails and the 

FBI doesn’t seem too eager to turn them over. We would appreciate 

working with your competent staff and you, as individual Members 

of Congress, to obtain these important documents. 

Congress needs to follow up and find out whether those in the 

FBI responsible for retaliating against whistleblowers like Michael 

German and Bassem Youssef are held accountable. Just giving lip 

service to protecting whistleblowers will not get the job done and 

bring justice. The FBI’s culture of retaliation will never change unless those who endorse or condone it face discipline for their actions. 

We all ought to be grateful for what Michael German and 

Bassem Youssef do for our country. They face very difficult circumstances, sacrificing family finances, their employability and the 

attempts by powerful interests to smear good names and reputations. 

For over two decades I have learned from and appreciated and 

tried to honor whistleblowers like these. Congress must have information from whistleblowers to do its constitutional job of oversight. 

Only whistleblowers can explain why something is wrong and help 

Congress locate the best evidence to prove it. 

Moreover, only whistleblowers can help us truly understand 

problems with the culture at Government agencies. At the FBI, 

where I focused much of my oversight efforts over the years, agents 

who blow the whistle about problems or wrongdoing do not enjoy 

the same protections as other Federal Government employees. Congress has attempted to fix this problem with various versions of 

whistleblower reform bills. One bill, S. 274, which I am a cosponsor, unanimously passed the Senate in December and would address a number of issues within what Federal whistleblower laws 

that remain outstanding. 

The witnesses you will hear from today, just as other whistleblowers before them, deserve the support of Congress for bringing 

to light problems with the Bureau. 

So thank you again for holding this important hearing. I am 

sorry our meeting didn’t start on time. I will go to the Senate now, 

but I look forward to reviewing the remainder of the proceedings 

once the transcript is available. 

So Mr. Chairman, I hope that we and our staffs can work together to follow up with the FBI in more detail on important issues 

and questions raised today not only by me but by your witnesses 

and by your staff. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Grassley follows:] 

5 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, 

A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF IOWA


CG-1.eps
6 


CG-2.eps
7 


CG-3.eps
8 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you, Senator. The gentleman from Texas. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I was just going to 

thank Senator Grassley for your courage, as you brought up a history of retaliation from the FBI. It sounds like from what you had 

said today, you may be next on the hit list. So we will look forward 

to working with you. 

Senator GRASSLEY. Well, my colleagues have told me that I must 

be squeaky clean or I would have been out of here a long time ago. 

Mr. SCOTT. Well, thank you, Senator. And Senator, you were the 

original sponsor of the Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989. So 

you have been working on this issue for a long time. You passed 

a bill and we passed a bill that is pending in the Senate, so we 

need to get together to see what we can do, particularly insofar as 

it would protect the FBI officials. So we will be working together 

on that. 

Senator GRASSLEY. Thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

We will now resume regular order. And I will complete my opening statement. 

We depend on whistleblowers to expose illegal behavior, corruption and waste in Government. But without adequate protections, 

few will take the risk of revealing the truth. This Subcommittee 

has held hearings on waste and fraud in Government contracting 

in Iraq, which has led to loss of billions of taxpayer dollars. We 

have also investigated incidences of rape of Americans serving our 

country abroad and the killing of innocent civilians in Iraq. All of 

these investigations could have either been bolstered or prevented 

with the help of whistleblowers. And so in no other area is the 

truth more urgent than in national security at wartime, but it is 

exactly these areas where whistleblowers are being silenced. 

The hearing before us today will explore the troubling issue of 

why breaking ranks to speak the truth has led to the shoot-themessenger mentality at the FBI. Over the years the FBI has 

gained a reputation for harboring an anti-whistleblower culture 

where supervisors have repeatedly been found to retaliate against 

agents who repeat wrongdoing. Sadly these supervisors go 

unpunished, and no one knows this history better than the Senator 

who just spoke to us today, the Senator from Iowa, Mr. Grassley. 

A number of incidents at the FBI stand out, and we have two of 

these whistleblowers appearing with us today. 

The first is Special Agent Youssef. According to press reports, an 

internal investigation conducted by the Department of Justice concluded that as the FBI’s highest-ranking Arab-American agent, he 

was blocked from a counterterrorism assignment in 2002 after voicing concerns about the FBI’s counterterrorism operations. He tried 

to alert his colleagues on the misuse of national security letters, including exigent letters by which requests are submitted to telephone companies in emergency situations. He was ignored by supervisors and, as we now know, the FBI intentionally abused these 

letters in nonemergency situations, and they legally obtained information pursuant to faulty national security letters. If Mr. Youssef’s 

warnings had been heeded, maybe the Bureau would have stopped 

violating the law much earlier. 

9 

Another special agent, Agent German, worked on domestic terrorism cases for 14 years before facing retaliation which led to his 

departure from the FBI. He had concerns for the Bureau’s handling 

of the counterterrorism cases which he found that agents had illegally recorded conversations in violation of the Federal Wiretap 

Act. When he brought the matter to the attention of his supervisors, he was told to look the other way. He faced a retaliation and 

a Department of Justice Inspector General report substantiated 

many of his claims, including the Bureau’s falsification of records 

to cover up its mistakes. 

Compounding these specific cases of retaliation at the Bureau is 

the fact that there is no substantive whistleblower protection for 

these courageous individuals. Under current law, employees at key 

Government agencies in charge of protecting the United States, including the FBI and CIA, are excluded from conventional whistleblower protections. These workers deserve to have the same protection as other Federal employees, and they should feel as secure to 

come forward with information that is essential to national security 

without fear of retaliation. 

I hope this hearing will reveal creative ways that we can protect 

key whistleblowers and still maintain our national security. As the 

NSL matter demonstrated, Congress cannot fully conduct its oversight mandate if it cannot get reliable information that is both 

truthful and goes to the heart of the matter. 

So I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today. 

And with that, I yield to the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, the gentleman from Texas, Judge Gohmert. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Chairman Scott. I would like to first 

send a special welcome to our witnesses today as well and join 

Chairman Scott in doing so. I appreciate your taking time out of 

your schedule. I know you are not here because of the big money 

you get paid for being a witness, because obviously that isn’t any 

money. 

But Congress does have a long history of providing protection to 

executive branch employees who seek to report administrative 

issues, waste, fraud and abuse or allegations of corruption within 

their agency. 

In 1978, Congress enacted the Civil Service Reform Act to establish procedural protections for executive branch whistleblowers. 

Congress found that employees should be protected against reprisal 

for the lawful disclosure of information regarding violation of any 

rule of law, regulation or any mismanagement or gross waste of 

funds and abuse of authority or a substantial and specific danger 

to health, public health and safety. 

Congress intended to ensure that employees not be prohibited 

from communicating with Congress or sanctioned for disclosing information to a Member of Congress or staff. At the same time, Congress did not intend the whistleblower laws to protect substandard 

or corrupt employees from appropriate sanction or even termination. 

Congress provides these protections in 1989 and again in 1994 

with enactment of the Whistleblower Protection Act. Both the Civil 

Service Reform Act and the Whistleblower Protection Act included 

national security exceptions for employees who disclosed informaVerDate Aug 31 2005 16:48 Jan 13, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00013 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\CRIME\052108\42510.000 HJUD1 PsN: 42510
10 

tion which is classified or prohibited by statute. Moreover, current 

law expressly exempts employees of certain national security agencies, including the FBI, from filing a whistleblower claim under the 

WPA with the Office of Special Counsel. 

Employees of the FBI can file a complaint or a prohibited personnel action with the Office of Professional Responsibility or the 

Office of the Inspector General. However, opponents of this process 

argue that it is insufficient because it fails to provide a truly independent review of a whistleblower claim. 

Last year the House passed H.R. 985, which amends the Whistleblower Protection Act to extend whistleblower protections to Federal employees who specialize in national security issues. The bill 

extends whistleblower protections to employees of the FBI, CIA, 

Defense Intelligence Agency, National Geospatial Intelligence 

Agency, National Security Agency, National Reconnaissance Office 

and, quote, any other executive agency or element or unit thereof 

determined by the President to have as its principal function to 

conduct foreign intelligence or counterintelligence activities, unquote. 

We are joined today by former Special Agent Michael German, 

FBI supervisory special agent unit Chief Bassem Youssef, who 

have alleged retaliation against them for disclosing certain details 

about undercover and counterterrorism operations within the FBI. 

One of the things that became clear to me as I got to Congress 31⁄2

years ago was the dispelling of a myth that I had previously believed and that was, as a former judge, I had always felt that the 

American public was protected from overzealous intelligence activities by the FBI or some other entity by the judiciary. What I came 

to find out was, if the intelligence gathering by an entity such as 

the FBI is never intended to be introduced in court, there is no judicial protection. We found out things that had been done by J. 

Edgar Hoover as FBI Director with no intention ever of introducing 

those matters into court, just intelligence that could be used as it 

might be necessary. 

So once you realize that, you realize, gee, looks like the legislative branch is the balance of power when it comes to intelligence 

gathering both domestically and abroad. And therefore, the whistleblower protection seems to be even more important at that point. 

We had people that misunderstood across America after the raid on 

a Congressman’s office a couple of years ago. They misunderstood 

in that some people here had concerns not that the FBI would do 

a search of a congressional office because as far as I am concerned, 

if there is evidence there, a body, drugs, illicit money, anything, 

DNA, something like that, then I would say it ought to be wide 

open to being searched and seized. 

But the concern was, under the Constitution, the Speech and Debate Clause would protect someone who talked to a Member of 

Congress especially about issues with the FBI or some intelligence 

activity. And if a Congressional Record in a private congressional 

office here on the Hill could not be protected from a search by those 

people about whom complaints were made, then there would be no 

oversight, there would be no protection at all. And we would all be 

subject to whatever might be imposed upon us because Congress 

would not have the wherewithal to do proper oversight. 

11 

I am glad that we are not at that point and appreciate the efforts 

on both sides of the aisle to try to make sure we do a proper balance and appreciate your time in being here today. Thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Gohmert. The gentleman 

from Michigan, the Chairman of the full Committee. 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you. I ask unanimous consent to have my 

remarks entered into the record. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Conyers follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JOHN CONYERS, JR., A REPRESENTATIVE

IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, AND CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON THE

JUDICIARY

We are here today for three reasons. 

First, we need to explore and consider the very salutary aspect of whistleblowers— 

at the FBI and otherwise. Whistleblowers are uniquely positioned to expose waste, 

fraud and corruption in our government. By coming forward to challenge their superiors and the Administration, they risk their careers and livelihoods. 

• It was Daniel Ellsberg, whose Pentagon Papers exposed corruption in the Pentagon and helped build the case for our withdrawal from Vietnam. 

• It was Peter Buxton, the HHS employee who exposed the shameful Tuskeegee 

Syphilis Experiment, a government sanctioned project that gave placebos to 

thousands of African American men who had contracted the disease in order 

to study the long term effects of syphilis. 

• It was Dr. Fred Whitehurst, the FBI forensic scientist who exposed fraud and 

corruption in the FBI crime lab, through which we learned that numerous investigations of ‘‘judicial corruption’’ had been severely 

tainted. 

We owe a debt of gratitude to all of these individuals. 

Second, we need to consider the record of present and past Administrations with 

regard to whistleblowers. I would note that today’s witnesses Bassem Youssef and 

Michael German, an FBI agent and a former agent, have made serious and credible 

charges that they were punished by demotion and termination when they identified 

misconduct at the Bureau. Similarly, during the Clinton Administration Dr. Fred 

Whitehurst blew the whistle on misconduct at the FBI crime lab only to face recriminations within the Department. So the concerns we examine today are not partisan, they are institutional. 

Third, today’s hearing will allow us to consider the need for stronger legislation. 

Last year, Congress passed the Whistleblower Protection Act of 2007, which extended protection to federal workers who specialize in national security issues, but 

excluded FBI agents altogether due to supposed ‘‘national security,’’ concerns. As a 

result, under present law FBI whistleblowers have no court remedy whatsoever. 

I am concerned that FBI agents who face greater danger and far less protection 

than other federal whistleblowers, who face threats of criminal prosecution, and 

non-disclosure and pre-publication review agreements, are perhaps the most deserving of whistleblower protection. I hope today’s hearing will shed light on this important issue. 

I also want to thank my good friend and colleague Senator Charles Grassley for 

coming over to the House today. He has been a stalwart support of whistleblower 

protections over the years, regardless of party or partisanship. 

Mr. CONYERS. And after the powerful testimony of the Senator 

from Iowa and the courageous testimony of Judge Gohmert, I am 

really impressed about the decision of the Chairman of the Crime 

Subcommittee, Bobby Scott, to inquire into this area. The fact of 

the matter is the FBI is not covered by whistleblower protections 

at this moment, and we are going to learn from these gentlemen 

why that is. And we are going to have a little task on our hands, 

trying to convince not just the rest of the House but the Senate 

that they are entitled to these safeguards. 

12 

Every week new revelations fall out of the sky literally on things 

that have been going on in the executive branch or in the agencies 

and departments of this Government. And it is just amazing. The 

Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Immigration just gave me 

something out of The Washington Post in which this Committee is 

going to have brought to its attention. 

And these are not small issues either. We have got the former 

Attorney General coming here. We have got the Chief Counsel for 

the Vice President of the United States coming here. We have the 

former Secretary of State of Ohio coming here. And I am so proud 

of this Committee, both of Crime and the full Committee itself, 

about the questions that we dare to raise, and they are not in a 

partisan sense. We want a better Government. And we want a Government that doesn’t retaliate against those who would dare point 

out mistakes or wrongdoing and not them become the victims of 

the way we go about improving our system. And so I thank you 

very much, Chairman Scott. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. And we welcome the gentleman from 

Georgia, Mr. Johnson, who is with us today. And I would ask other 

Members to introduce their statements for the record. Without objection, so ordered. 

We will begin the panel. Our first witness will be Michael German, the Security Policy Counsel for the American Civil Liberties 

Union. He served as a special agent for the FBI for 16 years with 

responsibility for domestic terrorism, bank fraud and public corruption investigations. While at the FBI, he also served in undercover 

operations, successfully helping to prevent several terrorist attacks. 

He resigned in 2004 to make Congress and the public aware of the 

continuing deficiency in FBI counterterrorism operations after the 

implementation of the 9/11 Commission’s reforms. He is a graduate 

of Wake Forest University and earned his JD at Northwestern University Law School. 

Next we will have Bassem Youssef, who joined the FBI in 1988 

and was promptly assigned to the Middle Eastern terrorism cases. 

As part of his counterterrorism work, he obtained the Intelligence 

Community’s highly coveted Director of Central Intelligence Award 

in 1995. 1996, former Director Louis Freeh personally selected Mr. 

Youssef to establish the FBI’s Legal Attache Office in Saudi Arabia. Later in his career he was selected as the Chief of the Document Exploitation Unit within the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division, and in early 2005 he was assigned to his current position as 

Chief of the Communications Analysis Unit. He is a graduate of 

California State University. 

Each of your written statements will be made part of the record 

in its entirety. I would ask each of our witnesses to summarize 

your testimony in 5 minutes or less. And to help you stay within 

that time, a lighting device is at the table will start green, go to 

yellow when you have about a minute left, and will switch to red 

when your 5 minutes are up. 

We will begin with Mr. German. 

TESTIMONY OF MIKE GERMAN, POLICY COUNSEL, 

AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION 

Mr. GERMAN. Thank you. Chairman Scott, Chairman Conyers. 

13 

Mr. SCOTT. Is your microphone on? 

Mr. GERMAN. Sorry. Chairman Scott, Chairman Conyers and 

Ranking Member Gohmert, Members of the Committee, thank you 

for inviting me to speak with you about the treatment of whistleblowers at the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I represent the 

American Civil Liberties Union, which vigorously supports meaningful legal protection for all whistleblowers, particularly for those 

in the law enforcement and intelligence agencies where abuse and 

misconduct can directly affect our liberty as well as our security. 

Unfortunately, my experience with the FBI’s treatment of whistleblowers is all too personal. I joined the FBI in June 1988. And 

my journey from the FBI to the ACLU began 14 years later in 

early 2002. I was asked to assist the Tampa terrorism investigation 

that began when a supporter of an international terrorist organization met with the leader of a White supremacist group as part of 

an effort to establish operational ties. This January 2002 meeting 

was recorded by an FBI cooperating witness. I quickly learned of 

serious deficiencies in the investigation, but my efforts to get the 

case on track were met with indifference by FBI supervisors. The 

case remained stalled through August of 2002, when I learned that 

part of the January meeting had been recorded illegally. When I 

brought this to the attention of the supervisor responsible for the 

investigation, he told me we were just going to pretend it didn’t 

happen. Realizing a failure to correct this problem would imperil 

a future prosecution, I reported the matter through my chain of 

command. I didn’t know at the time that the FBI was exempt from 

whistleblower protection laws, but I didn’t think I needed to worry 

about retaliation. I had an unblemished disciplinary record and a 

history of superior performance praises. Twice during my career I 

had successfully infiltrated domestic terrorist organizations and 

prevented acts of terrorism by winning criminal convictions. As the 

FBI shifted to a terrorism prevention focus, I assumed this experience would be in high demand. 

Moreover, FBI Director Robert Mueller publicly urged FBI employees to report problems they saw in FBI counterterrorism operations, and he offered his personal assurance that retaliation 

against whistleblowers would not be tolerated. 

Unfortunately, Director Muller did not uphold his end of the bargain. Retaliation was tolerated and eventually successful in forcing 

me to leave the FBI. Over the course of 2 years, I was removed 

from one terrorism investigation, prevented from working on a second and denied opportunities to train new undercover agents. I reported the misconduct and the retaliation to the FBI Office of Professional Responsibility and the Department of Justice Inspector 

General in December of 2002 and again in February of 2003. I sent 

a third written complaint to the IG in October of 2003, yet neither 

OPR nor the IG opened an investigation or took any steps to protect me. Worse, both the IG and OPR leaked information from my 

complaints directly to the FBI officials I was complaining against. 

After I demanded the letter explaining why no investigation was 

opened, as is required by FBI whistleblower investigations, the IG 

finally opened a case in January of 2004. But nothing happened 

until April of 2004, when the IG requested I provide yet another 

sworn statement. 

14 

At that point I decided to report the matter to Congress and to 

resign from the FBI. Fortunately, Senator Charles Grassley championed my cause and his dogged pursuit of the underlying documentation of this investigation provides a glimpse into the dysfunctional management practices that harm our security and allow FBI 

managers to retaliate against agents who report misconduct. In 

January of 2006, a full year and a half after I resigned, 3 years 

after my first formal complaint to the IG and 4 years after these 

events took place, the IG finally issued a report confirming many 

of the allegations in my original complaint, including the Tampa 

Division terrorism case was not properly investigated or documented, that Tampa officials backdated and falsified FBI records, 

and finally that the FBI retaliated against me for reporting misconduct. 

Senator Grassley continued his pursuit of the truth and in the 

summer of 2006 he finally received the January 2002 transcript 

that the FBI and the IG claimed contains no discussion of terrorists. As Senator Grassley said, it is a lot closer to what Michael 

German described than what the FBI described. 

In closing, my odyssey demonstrates the need for greater congressional oversight of the FBI and DOJ. Neither our security nor 

our liberties are protected when incompetent FBI managers can so 

easily suppress evidence, falsify FBI records and retaliate against 

agents who dare report their abuse. Congress cannot perform effective oversight unless informed Federal employees and contractors 

are willing to tell the truth about what is happening within these 

agencies. And it is simply unfair to expect them to tell you the 

truth if they know it will cost them their jobs. 

Congress should extend meaningful protection to the workforce 

that is charged with protecting all of us by granting them full due 

process rights when they blow the whistle. 

Thank you for the opportunity to present our views, and I request that my written statement to the Committee be entered into 

the record. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. German follows:] 

15 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF MICHAEL GERMAN


MG-1.eps
16 


MG-2.eps
17 


MG-3.eps
18 


MG-4.eps
19 


MG-5.eps
20 


MG-6.eps
21 


MG-7.eps
22 


MG-8.eps
23 


MG-9.eps
24 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. Your written statement—both written 

statements will be made part of the record in its entirety. Mr. 

Youssef. 

TESTIMONY OF BASSEM YOUSSEF, UNIT CHIEF, COMMUNICATIONS ANALYST DIVISION, COUNTERTERRORISM DIVISION, 

FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION 

Mr. YOUSSEF. It is a great honor and a privilege for me to be 

here. 

Mr. SCOTT. Could you turn on your microphone? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Yes. It was turned off. 

Mr. SCOTT. Mr. Youssef, could you identify the person sitting to 

your right? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Yes, sir. Chairman, this is Mr. Steve Cohen, my 

attorney, and he is present here today to answer any technical or 

legal questions that I may not be at liberty to discuss. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Thank you, sir. 

As I started to say, it really is a great honor to be here before 

this distinguished Committee. I think in my 20-year career in the 

FBI I never dreamt in a million years that I would be sitting here 

speaking before Congress. And my greatest goal today is to be able 

to get the message across to Congress, to this distinguished Committee, that the FBI—the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division is illequipped to handle the terrorist threat that we are facing. Regardless of what happens to me when I walk into the Hoover Building 

tomorrow, that is what I am hoping that I would be able to convey 

to you. 

Let me start by just saying that I have a great love and admiration for the FBI itself, for what it stands for as an organization, 

and for the men and women that I have worked with and continue 

to work with within the FBI. But I do have serious concerns about 

the current state of affairs of the FBI and the FBI’s 

Counterterrorism Division, and specifically the position that we 

find ourselves in today almost 8 years after the 9/11 attacks. 

To maybe explain a little better of where we are today inside the 

FBI, allow me to take you back to 1993 before the 1993 World 

Trade Center bombing which took place on February 26, 1993. 

I would say right now that I am one of the very, very few agents 

who have worked counterterrorism and worked on this particular 

investigation of the World Trade Center bombing that is still in the 

FBI today. Most of the agents that have worked on that particular 

investigation either have left or have gone on to other positions. 

Let me just give you a little backdrop. Obviously I can’t discuss 

anything classified, so I am going to try to explain this to the best 

I know how without being totally open on what is in the files. 

In early 1993 I began to work on a particular group in a particular field office and was working with other field offices that 

were trying to obtain a FISA on the blind sheikh, on Sheikh Omar 

Abdel Rahman. I had worked terrorism my entire career up until 

that time. And the FISA was not obtainable simply because—or 

this is what I was told by FBI headquarters—is that we can’t touch 

him. He is a religious man. Obviously a lack of understanding of 

the intelligence of who this man is. And the information that I was 

25 

able to obtain from my own sources and my operation that I was 

working at the time was extremely instrumental in actually getting 

us over the hump and actually getting the FISA approved on the 

blind sheikh. Unfortunately, that particular FISA was approved 9 

days before the actual bombing of February 26, 1993. In 9 days 

there would be no way for anyone to be able to catch the threat 

and comprehend the threat and stop it. 

Even though we didn’t understand it fully at the time, there was 

an understanding within the FBI in those days that we do need the 

expertise in language, in the Arabic language, understanding just 

the mindset of the enemy and the cultural innuendos, especially 

when you deal with sources and with subjects. There was that understanding and the need to beef up that particular cadre of 

counterterrorism agents. 

Unfortunately, the Counterterrorism Division today still suffers 

from lack of expertise in counterterrorism matters, specifically with 

Middle Eastern counterterrorism matters and lack of understanding or appreciation for the language, having the language and 

the cultural understanding. 

I would like to, if I may, just to give you a glimpse of how things 

are today in the Counterterrorism Division, to read to you a couple 

of e-mails that have been circulating within the FBI. 

The first one is dated March 5, 2008. I am sorry. I will start with 

the one in 2007. April 16, 2007. This is what the e-mail states, and 

it has been sent to everyone in the Counterterrorism Division. 

The CTD is hosting a conference next week at LX 1 to train new 

ITOS supervisors, and in parenthesis, for those of you who don’t 

know, approximately 12 supervisory special agents from Quantico 

were transferred to work in ITOS 1. And this training is to help 

to get them to know CT investigations. We plan to show the video 

and have a short question and answer period following the video. 

If I may just take 2 seconds to decipher what that means. ITOS 

1. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Chairman, I would ask unanimous consent to 

allow him whatever time he needs to finish it. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Thank you, sir. 

If I may just explain the meaning behind each term on this particular e-mail. ITOS 1 is the International Terrorism Operations 

Section, which is the premier counterterrorism division section that 

deals with tracking al Qaeda and al Qaeda’s activities. These 12 

supervisory special agents are obviously in a supervisory position 

who would be leading and directing operations of the field. They 

come from the training division. They have absolutely no 

counterterrorism experience whatsoever. They probably have 

worked in criminal matters and noncounterterrorism matters. And 

they were actually drafted into the Counterterrorism Division to 

work and actually run the operations of the field. 

They have absolutely no experience whatsoever to the point that 

the author of this e-mail was saying, we need to show them a video 

to get them to understand the innuendos of counterterrorism investigations. 

I will tell you that I know specifically this video would teach 

them nothing about counterterrorism because it comes from my 

26 

unit. These supervisors were drafted, and in fact eventually ended 

up leaving because they couldn’t stay where they were in the ITOS 

section. This was dated April 16, 2007. 

If I may read another e-mail that was sent out by the 

Counterterrorism Division on March 5, 2008. And this is what the 

e-mail states. 

Executive management is canvassing the division for volunteers 

GS-14 supervisory special agents to be permanently reassigned to 

ITOS 1. This is due to the fact that ITOS 1 is currently at 62 percent of its funded staffing level. It is critical that the CT mission 

fill these positions as soon as possible. 

Gentlemen, this is March 5, 2008. If the FBI’s premier 

counterterrorism section is operating at 62 percent of its funded 

staffing level, that means if there are 100 seats in that section, 

there are only 62 seats being filled. However, if you talk to the 

counterterrorism executives, they will say that we are doing phenomenal work. If I may equate this to a car with six cylinders operating on three cylinders, it is not doing phenomenal work or is not 

performing phenomenally. 

The amazing thing about these two e-mails is that they are only 

symptomatic of what is really going on in the Counterterrorism Division today. And again, we are talking about almost 8 years after 

the 9/11 attacks. 

In the FBI everyone who is interested in moving up the ladder 

of promotion would want to be jockeying for positions in the number one priority of the investigations being worked by the FBI. The 

Counterterrorism Division is unable to keep agents, supervisors 

and analysts within the division. And 62 percent is an alarmingly 

low figure. 

While all this was going on, there have been in the last 4 or 5 

years several requests by field offices within the FBI and other intelligence agencies who have known of my work prior to 9/11, requesting me to offer assistance in training their agents and their 

analysts and specifically counterterrorism, Middle Eastern 

counterterrorism matters as well as help or consult with the ongoing operations that they have in the field. 

Each time I was requested, my supervisors blocked the request 

just saying that I was busy. And the field offices would call me 

back or the other agencies would call me back and say, what is 

going on? And I had no explanation to give, other than, this is 

what is coming from the front office. 

We still have agents who are highly dedicated within the 

Counterterrorism Division who want to do a very good job, but they 

are unable to because they are not given the tools or the assets 

that they need to actually understand the enemy and get into the 

mind of the enemy that we are facing today. 

This is the summary of my position and where we are in the FBI. 

And I very much look forward to answering any questions that you 

have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Youssef follows:] 

27 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF BASSEM YOUSSEF


BY-1.eps
28 


BY-2.eps
29 


BY-3.eps
30 


BY-4.eps
31 


BY-5.eps
32 


BY-6.eps
33 


BY-7.eps
34 


BY-8.eps
35 


BY-9.eps
36 


BY-10.eps
37 


BY-11.eps
38 


BY-12.eps
39 


BY-13.eps
40 


BY-14.eps
41 


BY-15.eps
42 


BY-16.eps
43 


BY-17.eps
44 


BY-18.eps
45 


BY-19.eps
46 


BY-20.eps
47 


BY-21.eps
48 


BY-22.eps
49 


BY-23.eps
50 


BY-24.eps
51 


BY-25.eps
52 


BY-26.eps
53 


BY-27.eps
54 


BY-28.eps
55 


BY-29.eps
56 


BY-30.eps
57 


BY-31.eps
58 


BY-32.eps
59 


BY-33.eps
60 


BY-34.eps
61 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you very much. Thank you both for your testimony. We will have questions now from the panel. 

I recognize myself first for 5 minutes and just ask both of you 

to briefly comment on, how can we tell the difference between a 

bona fide whistleblower and someone who is just a disgruntled or 

incompetent employee or if there is just a good faith disagreement 

over policy? 

Mr. GERMAN. I think a very quick investigation would reveal that 

pretty easily. I mean, that was one of the very frustrating things 

about my complaint is that everything was very well documented 

when I made the complaint. And you know, in the first 3 or 4 

months when things weren’t going the way I thought they would, 

I was really confused until I found out that the managers involved 

were actually falsifying documents and, you know, saying that this 

particular meeting had never been recorded. 

Well, I had a copy of the transcript of that meeting. So I went 

up to Washington, D.C. to meet with the IG and OPR and show 

them the transcript of the meeting that these FBI supervisors were 

saying didn’t exist. And yet that still didn’t change their opinion on 

whether to open an investigation. And in fact, in that meeting they 

told me that they called down to the Tampa field office to tell them 

that I had a copy of the transcript, which of course made things 

worse for me, not better. Rather than doing an investigation to find 

out—you know, now you have two problems, the failure of a terrorism investigation and FBI managers falsifying records. But yet 

there wasn’t an interest in pursuing that investigation. 

And you know, I just feel like and particularly as a former investigator, it is pretty easy to tell, you know, you follow the evidence. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Chairman Scott, I will echo the sentiments in what 

Mr. German mentioned here. However, one added thing that would 

be very simple is to look again at the performance appraisals, to 

look and to see if there is anything in the whistleblower’s records 

that would show maybe there was an issue before and they are trying to maybe deflect it. If there isn’t anything like that, especially 

if you look at a stellar career—I am not talking about either one 

of us here. I am saying any whistleblower—you would see that it 

becomes totally unprompted and all of a sudden almost a situation 

where the agency turns on the individual. 

Mr. SCOTT. How can we tell whether there is just a few bad apples, that this is an isolated incident as opposed to a situation 

where there is an expectation that you would look the other way 

when you see wrongdoing? 

Mr. GERMAN. I would think the repetition of whistleblowers that 

come forward and report retaliation would show that this is not 

simply an isolated incident and in fact is part of a larger culture 

within the FBI. And you know, I think it is as simple as just going 

to the Inspector General’s Web page and reading the many reports. 

Pick the topic of your choice, whether it is national security letters 

or the FBI’s involvement in detainee abuse or the FBI’s mismanagement of confidential funds, to reveal that there are serious 

problems within the FBI. And you know, it can’t be that there are 

all these very dedicated employees who simply don’t want to tell 

Congress that these problems exist. 

62 

Mr. YOUSSEF. In my specific case, former Director Louis Freeh 

was deposed regarding my situation, and he specifically in his deposition said that I should be utilized in effecting and continuing liaison that I started with the Saudi Arabian Government when I 

was the first legal attache. Yet what happened from inside the FBI 

and the current administration of the FBI was that I was blocked 

from any contact with any Government officials. I believe that is 

one tell-tale sign. 

Senator Grassley when he was here, he testified that the fact 

that he has asked for e-mail traffic a year ago and the FBI still 

refused to comply with that. Those e-mails would again tell an incredible story. 

Mr. SCOTT. Exactly what kind of protections would you need to 

have effective whistleblowing? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. I believe that when the bill first came out earlier, 

I believe it was this year, an e-mail went out from the Office of 

Legal Counsel in the FBI saying that there will be no retaliation 

against whistleblowers. Everyone is mandated to actually watch a 

video to show that you cannot retaliate against whistleblowers. Yet 

within 2 months after that, comments are being said about me behind my back and even to my face at a unit chiefs’ meeting where 

the issue of whistleblowers comes up. And one individual said, 

whistleblowers, hang ’em. And I was in the room. And everyone 

knew where I stand on this issue. I felt compelled to send an email to the Director’s Office and to my boss, the Deputy Assistant 

Director, explaining exactly what happened at this meeting and 

saying that if we are serious about protecting whistleblowers that 

something has to be done about comments like that because they 

are extremely alarming. 

What ended up happening is 2 weeks later that individual was 

honored with a birthday party for making these comments. So I 

probably have not answered your question, Chairman Scott, but it 

is a pretty serious situation there. 

Mr. GERMAN. And I would suggest that H.R. 985 has some very 

good protections built into it but—I mean to sort of shorten it down 

to giving the FBI agent an opportunity to get into court. You know, 

the problem is this is a very closed system. So there was no sort 

of reasonable person that didn’t have an interest in protecting the 

Department of Justice involved in looking at my complaint. So once 

things had gone sour, it was very difficult to have this land on 

somebody’s desk to take a fresh look at and an objective view of 

what had transpired. 

Mr. SCOTT. And should we be concerned about national security 

if we encourage whistleblowers within national security organizations, FBI and other law enforcement agencies? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Absolutely, sir. I believe that there are avenues, 

maybe in a closed session, in a classified session to bring out the 

issues that are at hand and there should be no issue in terms of 

saying, this is classified, we can’t discuss it. 

Mr. GERMAN. And I would just second that you know FBI agents 

are very concerned about national security. That is how they spend 

their time and what they are interested in. The last thing they 

want to do, if you talk to an FBI agent, is to be in front of Congress 

testifying. They want to keep this in-house. And it is the inability 

63 

to receive any sort of protections that compel agents to try to find 

somebody either in Congress or in the courts to correct the situation. 

Mr. SCOTT. Or in the press? 

Mr. GERMAN. Or the press. And if there were avenues and protections that worked for them to report to responsible officials, I 

think that would be something that would protect information better than—— 

Mr. SCOTT. And is an Inspector General insufficient? 

Mr. GERMAN. I believe if you look at the history of my case, you 

will see that the Inspector General’s Office’s performance was insufficient, greatly insufficient. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

The gentleman from Texas. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Chairman Scott. The testimony has 

raised a number of questions. 

First of all, you have mentioned the e-mail, Mr. Youssef, about 

training for counterterrorism. You said you knew it wouldn’t be effective because it was produced by your unit. Don’t you make good 

videos? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. We make a very good video, sir. 

Mr. GOHMERT. But not adequate to train people in 

counterterrorism? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. This specific video was for training on—exposing 

the viewer to certain tools within our section. And our section, the 

section that I work in, is a technical section. It doesn’t deal with 

the actual operations of counterterrorism investigations. 

Mr. GOHMERT. You mentioned that counterterrorism is at 62 percent, unable to keep agents in the unit. When we had Director 

Mueller in here, one of the things that I have been concerned about 

for some time is his 5-year up or out policy. Are you familiar with 

that? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Absolutely, sir. 

Mr. GOHMERT. And the concern that I have and have had for 

some time has been the loss of—when he was here, I said hundreds 

of years but based on other information I have seen, apparently we 

have lost thousands of years of FBI experience. And of course that 

is the policy where if you are in the field as a supervisor, you can 

only be there 5 years to the day, and then you either come to 

Washington or you get demoted or you get out. And I appreciated 

the comment for the FBI spokesman in saying, yeah, they were just 

drawn out of the FBI because of all the money. And I know that 

is not right. There are too many people that wanted to stay in the 

FBI but were not going to come to Washington. And so sure, they 

could have made better money all along. But they wanted to serve 

their country and the FBI. And so I just know too many people 

past, present, who work for the FBI that I would trust with my life. 

But I am greatly concerned about the lack of experience that we 

had. And that was an issue that came up with the national security letter abuse when the IG report came back. And I heard Director Mueller in a press conference say he took the full responsibility. 

It was his job to make sure that there was adequate experience 

and training in those areas so these kind of abuses didn’t happen. 

And obviously they have. 

64 

I would just like to ask you directly, you have mentioned someone saying, whistleblowers, hang ’em, and he got a birthday party. 

Do you mind telling me who that was? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Well, Congressman Gohmert, if you don’t mind, I 

would just like to limit it to the fact that it was a unit chief of one 

of the other units without mentioning the name. 

Mr. GOHMERT. So now we are going to have to go find out who 

had a birthday party after that one you mentioned to figure that 

out. 

Mr. SCOTT. I think the gentleman might be more likely to give 

us his name in private rather than in a public hearing. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. I certainly would be willing to do that. Thank you. 

Mr. GOHMERT. In your testimony, you mentioned FBI agents. In 

the written testimony you submitted, you simply have adopted 

electronic surveillance practices from the criminal side of the Bureau into the counterterrorism side, and so I would like you to explain, are you talking about wiretaps, NSLs, warrantless surveillance? Can you specify more particularly? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Yes, sir. 

I would like to just echo the concern of many agents within the 

Bureau about the comment you made, which is very astute, about 

the 5 year and out before I get into your question. 

Mr. GOHMERT. In that regard, I can’t help but wonder if that 

may be part of the 62 percent problem in counterterrorism. Some 

people that would be excellent just say, I am not going there. Do 

you know of another reason it is at 62 percent, why people are not 

willing to go into that unit? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Yes, sir. What is happening, when you have a 

team of agents who are very dedicated to do the best job they can 

to counter the threat, but they just simply don’t have the experience, and they are supposed to be running the operations of the 

field, and there is a feeling of inadequacy that they don’t know 

about the threats—they may come from a criminal background, a 

white-collar background, and that is where they thrive and know 

their business—and you throw them and literally draft them into 

a discipline they have not worked before, there is a sense of feeling 

this is not where I should be. 

So you find that, first of all, if the executives themselves who are 

managing the entire section or the division are not where they 

should be in terms of the experience level that needs to be there 

for running these operations, you are going to see agents, analysts 

and other folks working in that division that are overworked because they are overassigned. 

When you go after every single threat and look at it like it is the 

real deal, you will be spending an inordinate amount of time, not 

just time but personnel, resources, looking at a threat that maybe 

if you had the experience, you can tell in the first day or two that 

this is not a viable threat, and we need to move on to the next one. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Good point. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. This happens just about every weekend where 

folks are called in, and while they are waiting, they know this 

threat is not a real threat. There is a sense of discouragement. 

When these agents go back to the field, they tell others do not put 

65 

in for this division. So that is another reason for the lack of filling 

these positions. 

Mr. GERMAN. May I just respond? 

Mr. GOHMERT. Please. 

Mr. GERMAN. The selection and the retention of FBI managers 

are just symptoms of a larger problem in the FBI’s dysfunctional 

management system. 

There have been a number of studies over the years of the FBI’s 

management system. I am not sure that they ever saw the light of 

day, but I would encourage you to request those documents. They 

would be steps that actually showed what are the significant structural problems that cause not just these problems, but the other 

problems you see, problems that the IG reports so often bring out. 

Mr. GOHMERT. We had a report discussed in a prior hearing 

about the software system, not just software, but that had to be 

scrapped, that cost about $200 million or $199 million, according 

to what we heard here today, and that was partly to blame on the 

inadequacy or the inconsistency of those working with the system 

because of the constant change of supervisors. 

But you didn’t get around to answering the question about what 

kind of surveillance, if you can answer. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Yes, sir. In my testimony I am speaking specifically of the utilization of national security letters and other legaltype instruments, such as subpoenas, excessively where there is no 

need to use them. 

But I can also speak of certain examples that I was not directly 

involved in myself because I don’t deal with FISA-type matters 

that I was aware of that came across my desk. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Okay. Thank you. I realize my time has expired. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman from Michigan. 

Mr. CONYERS. Thanks to everybody for what you are doing here 

today. 

The Washington Post has a front-page article today that praises 

the FBI, at least from what I am reading, ‘‘Audit Finds FBI Reports on Detainee Abuse Ignored.’’ There is considerable back-andforth between the Department of Defense and the National Security Adviser about the FBI working scrupulously in this area. I 

think it reflects the fact that there are a lot of people at a lot of 

levels that are very concerned about it. 

But today’s hearing is one in which we find out that whistleblowers have literally no protection in the FBI, and that their criticisms are not only not processed, but are not welcomed, and that 

gets to the culture that you have both talked about and Senator 

Grassley did as well. And so we find that there are good things 

happening, and there are things that we have got to do to correct 

it. 

We find that the abuses within the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division might have more light shed on it if we could get ahold of some 

e-mails or correspondence that support and document both of your 

attempts to notify your superiors at the FBI. I don’t think it is unreasonable to think that there are a number of other people that 

might come forward if they realized that whistleblowers are unpopular, they ought to be hung, as someone remarked in your presence. And so I would like you to both tell us a little bit about what 

66 

we might hope to find through these documents and e-mails that 

we are going to request very shortly. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. I would like to start, Chairman Conyers, and 

thank you for the question. 

The current IG investigation, which obviously I cannot discuss in 

this setting, or at least in detail, has just about every e-mail that 

I submitted and others that they have requested to conduct their 

investigation. And they have the entire picture. 

I believe one of the reasons the FBI is reluctant to hand these 

over to Senator Grassley, who has asked for them in the past, is 

because they paint a very clear picture of the fact that when I was 

transferred to that unit, to the Communications Analysis Unit, 

within a very short period of time I began to realize that there 

were issues with the use of national security letters, and that I had 

actually gone to my superiors explaining to them that there is an 

issue here that we need to deal with. 

I not just went to my superiors, but I went to the Office of General Counsel and explained to them the issue at hand. In fact, I 

called a meeting with the Operations Section, Section Chief, as well 

as Office of General Counsel saying this is going to kill us. We need 

to actually get the NSLs before we go and conduct a search. 

Everyone agreed it is important, and they vowed to support our 

stance; however, nothing was done about the backlog. No offer of 

any type of solution to fix the backlog. 

To give you, again, a backdrop of where I was, the section and 

division I am in, the previous Unit Chief before me who became the 

Assistant Section Chief, my immediate boss, comes from the criminal side of the house, worked drugs, and he was the one who approved the policy of using the exigent letters, but has never worked 

in counterterrorism before. 

My boss’s boss, the Section Chief, was the one responsible for the 

Mayfield investigation. This was a Portland investigation where we 

arrested an attorney, but he was the wrong individual, on a terrorism matter, and he was retained for several weeks. 

My boss’s boss’s boss, the Deputy Assistant Director, admitted in 

depositions that he had absolutely no terrorism experience whatsoever, and that his counterterrorism experience as the DAD, or Deputy Assistant Director, is on-the-job training. 

So it was very difficult to get them to maybe understand the 

magnitude of the problem. But I believe one other factor here is the 

fact that it is coming from me specifically, an already known whistleblower who has a known issue with the Bureau. So I was set 

aside basically. 

Mr. CONYERS. How many letters and how many e-mails would 

we expect to have turned over to the Committee? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. I believe there are hundreds. 

Mr. CONYERS. It is in the hundreds. 

Now, the national security letters themselves pose a big problem. 

When we caught them going out in huge amounts, and they were 

being sent out illegally, and the Director admitted that they were 

contrary, they were being used contrary to the law, and we thought 

and we hoped that they were stopped. I am beginning to wonder 

about what is going on over there these days. 

67 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Chairman Conyers, as I began to push for someone 

to do something about the NSLs around the time of 2005 and 2006, 

I have had numerous interactions with the Office of General Counsel. 

In 2006, in mid-2006, there is an e-mail from an individual from 

general counsel that is actually giving us guidance, giving my unit 

guidance to continue to use the exigent letters and to start using 

them pronto. This is from the Office of General Counsel. These are 

the legal beagles. Anyone in operations would know just the framework of operations; but in terms of a legal instrument, they are the 

head honchos who would know what is right and what is wrong. 

Mr. CONYERS. But are they being used legally or not? I don’t 

mind the use of NSLs; we weren’t trying to stop them from using 

them, we were trying to stop them from using them improperly. 

Are you suggesting that that stop order is being ignored, or that 

they are being sent out willy-nilly? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. I can’t really comment on the frame of mind of the 

Office of Legal Counsel as to why they would issue such guidance. 

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, if I might just be able to indulge 

Attorney German for any responses that I have raised during my 

questioning. Thank you. 

Mr. GERMAN. Well, I think, again, these are all symptoms. So 

much of what comes out, you know, in the few times we are able 

to peek behind the door is catastrophic, confusion between what 

the agents are doing on the ground and what management knows 

and is telling them. And the latest IG report that came out yesterday is an example of that. 

Where the agents on the ground who are trying to do the best 

job they can are reporting up the chain of command that we are 

seeing things that don’t seem right to us, that appear to be illegal, 

what do we do? 

And as the IG report says, they were getting very little back, and 

there seemed to be at least some effort not to document what was 

happening. 

In other words, one of the things that surprised me when I came 

over to the ACLU and looked at the documents that the ACLU had 

received through their Freedom of Information Act on the FBI’s involvement on detainee issues were how many were in e-mail. Email is obviously not the primary mode of communication, and certainly not the official mode of communication in the FBI, so why 

are all of these very serious matters being discussed in e-mail? 

There is one portion of the IG report where they discuss a situation where the Office of General Counsel asked some agents in 

Guantanamo to document the abuse that they were seeing. It says 

in the report that 6 months later they were given the authority to 

write the document. Well, obviously the abuse didn’t stop in that 

6 months, so why in the world would the FBI not allow that to be 

documented for that period of time? 

Mr. CONYERS. Well, why are they using e-mail if you think it is 

probably not the best method to go about communicating? 

Mr. GERMAN. Well, I think it is much easier for e-mail to disappear. In fact, in my investigation, in my complaint, I asked the 

IG to pull the e-mails because I believed that the agents, the superVerDate Aug 31 2005 16:48 Jan 13, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00071 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\CRIME\052108\42510.000 HJUD1 PsN: 42510
68 

visors who were engaged in the retaliation were operating in a concerted fashion, and he refused. Or at least he didn’t. 

Mr. CONYERS. But there are some circumstances when the emails don’t disappear, and that creates yet another problem when 

they are discovered. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

The gentleman from Georgia. 

Mr. JOHNSON. Mr. Chairman, I want to start by thanking you for 

holding this important hearing. This hearing is fundamental to the 

protections of the liberties that we enjoy in this country. I appreciate you and the Ranking Member, Judge Gohmert, for holding 

this hearing because we have certain rights that you gentlemen 

were sworn to protect, and you can be prosecuted for not protecting 

those rights. So when you do the job you have been sworn to do, 

and you point out illegalities, such as you, Mr. German, when calling attention to illegal wiretapping, and you, Mr. Youssef, in calling illegal attention to national security letters, it is very important 

to the protection of our liberties in this country that we have individuals who are as courageous as you both have been in being 

whistleblowers, people with superior knowledge who have the courage to reveal illegalities. 

It is certainly a shame in terms of the FBI and other intelligence-gathering organizations, such as the CIA and all of the 

other, I think 19 additional intelligence-gathering organizations 

that exist, are not subject to the Federal Whistleblower Protection 

Act. You all are specifically excluded from the act. So that means 

that the Government can retaliate against you for fulfilling the duties that you have been sworn to uphold, and there appears to be 

no way of sanctioning the FBI if they don’t use the information in 

court. So this is a very disturbing revelation or series of revelations 

that you all have testified to. I am disturbed about it very much. 

I will ask Mr. Youssef, to what extent has the FBI utilized your 

extensive counterterrorism experience, language capabilities, successful liaison and cultural knowledge of the Middle East throughout your career with the agency? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Thank you, Congressman Johnson, for your comments. 

Throughout my career, which started in March 1988, when the 

policy in the FBI at the time that a special agent being able to 

work counterterrorism or counterintelligence would have to have 

spent 5 years working nonintelligence matters because it was such 

a high and lofty discipline, I believe at the time I was thrown into 

that squad, terrorism squad, literally within 4 months because of 

my background as an individual who was born in Cairo, Egypt, and 

lived for 13 years there until I immigrated with my family to the 

United States. And the fact that I was a fluent Arabic speaker at 

a level 4, the Bureau utilized my background and my experience 

and talents extensively up until 9/11. 

I was blessed by God to be able to recruit some highly sensitive 

sources that were instrumental in getting highly valuable intelligence. 

69 

Mr. JOHNSON. Let me stop you right there because there was a 

visible gasp when you said ‘‘up to 9/11.’’ I would be remiss if I were 

not to follow up on that. 

What was it about September 11, 2001, that resulted in your declining usage by the FBI? 

Well, let me ask you, do you feel like it was discrimination based 

on your national identity? Do you feel like there was some hesitation by those within the FBI because they were suspicious of 

your heritage? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Sir, I will say that during my years of operations, 

field operations, I was working some highly sensitive investigations 

and recruited again some highly sensitive sources, to the point that 

my superiors in the field office suggested I use an undercover name 

as an FBI agent, not to use my name as Bassem Youssef as an FBI 

agent to protect my personal life from my meetings with sources 

and subjects, specifically Middle Eastern subjects. 

In fact, I was approved by the Attorney General then to have different credentials and a different name, and very few people within 

the Bureau even knew my true name. The name was a Western 

name. When I went overseas to take the assignment of legal attache—— 

Mr. JOHNSON. This was prior to 9/11? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Yes. I began to use my true name in 1996 when 

I went to work the Khobar Towers investigation in Riyadh, Saudi 

Arabia, and became the legal attache for 4 years. When I came 

back, I was assigned to Langley, Virginia, in the National 

Counterterrorism Center. And somehow after 9/11, there was a 

confusion on my name with some other agent who had had some 

issues with the Bureau who also is of Egyptian background and 

had refused to wear a wire on a particular counterterrorism operation because of his religious beliefs. He was a Muslim and felt he 

would not want to be targeting another Muslim. Somehow that got 

stuck to me, and there is a mistaken identity of the name. If I 

would say it became comical several years later, at the time—— 

Mr. JOHNSON. Was it truly a mistake? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. My name was mentioned in several circles as this 

is the individual, this is the agent who refused to wear a wire. It 

was ascribed to me again, the indiscretion of another agent who 

happened to have been in Riyadh following my tenure there. 

At the time it was significant and sad, but years later it became 

comical when I found out that here the FBI is supposed to be following these terrorists with Middle Eastern names, and we can’t 

get the names of two Arabic-speaking agents in the Bureau 

straight who are right there and not hiding under any bushes. 

Mr. JOHNSON. Is it fair to say you would have been willing to 

wear a wire; you would not have had the same hesitation that the 

other Youssef had with respect to investigating Muslims? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. The other gentleman’s name was not Youssef. It 

was just another Middle Eastern name. 

Mr. JOHNSON. That is even more egregious. So they hit you with 

a broad paintbrush, and everybody is the same if you are of Middle 

Eastern heritage? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Assuming, I guess, I am another Arab, that I was 

a Muslim, which I am not. I am a Christian. So that was also conVerDate Aug 31 2005 16:48 Jan 13, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00073 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\CRIME\052108\42510.000 HJUD1 PsN: 42510
70 

fused. But I would say I have never, ever turned down an undercover assignment, and have worked extensively as an undercover 

agent because at that time I was the first and only agent of Egyptian background. And obviously if you need to infiltrate a group or 

assume the identity of an undercover agent, you must look the part 

and talk the talk and so on. 

As a matter of fact, even when I left operations, field operations, 

and became a midlevel manager, there have been times when requests have come from field offices and even from headquarters 

asking me if I would be involved in undercover operations, and 

they would present me with the actual proposal on the undercover 

operations, saying to me—qualifying the fact that we know you are 

no longer in operations, but would you look at this operation because you are the only one who can do this, and I have accepted 

on each occasion. They are cases that you would actually know 

about from the papers, but obviously without mentioning my name. 

Mr. JOHNSON. You are a certified Arabic-speaking FBI polygraph 

examiner; are you not? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. I am. 

Mr. JOHNSON. Have your skills been utilized by the FBI after the 

events of September 11, 2001? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Not once. As a matter of fact, a colleague of mine 

who went to polygraph school with me in the 1994-1995 time 

frame, we were sort of podmates, he mentioned to me 2 years after 

the September 11 attacks, we are looking at close to 500 Arabicspeaking individuals that we need to polygraph, and there is no native-speaking Arabic polygraph examiner to do it. In those cases, 

they were done through a surrogate translator. 

If you talk with anyone in the very, very prestigious Department 

of Defense Polygraph Institute, where you actually go as an FBI 

agent to be saturated on polygraph matters, one of the best training that I have ever received in the Bureau, they will tell you that 

you always want to use a polygraph examiner who speaks the native tongue of the individual being polygraphed and not utilize a 

surrogate. 

Mr. JOHNSON. Thank you. 

Mr. Chairman, I am quite disturbed by this obvious gap in the 

ability to gather intelligence that would protect Americans from an 

attack. I am very disturbed. Thank you for allowing me to go over 

my time, sir. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you for your questions. 

The gentleman from Massachusetts. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Gentlemen, I want to also acknowledge your courage and thank 

you for your service. It is a service to this country, and you are to 

be applauded for that. 

Mr. German, let me direct one question to you. In the Committee 

memorandum it indicates that you had found some serious problems with the campus division handling of the counterterrorism investigation, including Title 3 issues? 

Mr. GERMAN. Right. There was an ongoing domestic terrorism investigation. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. You reported that to your supervisor, and he 

asked you to ignore it? 

71 

Mr. GERMAN. Yes. He said, we are going to pretend it didn’t happen. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. It didn’t happen. 

Whatever happened to that supervisor? 

Mr. GERMAN. He was promoted. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Thank you. 

In 2006, the inspector general found that the FBI retaliated 

against you and actually falsified records related to this particular 

case; is that accurate? 

Mr. GERMAN. That is accurate. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. This is a finding of the inspector general that 

records of the FBI were falsified? 

Mr. GERMAN. Yes. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Does that constitute a violation of the United 

States Criminal Code? 

Mr. GERMAN. Yes, it does. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Have there been any criminal prosecutions as a 

result that you are aware of? 

Mr. GERMAN. No. Neither the FBI nor the IG has identified who 

they said did it. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Is it true that an FBI spokesman went on television and said that you were full of hot air? 

Mr. GERMAN. I don’t remember that exact quote, but it is close. 

And they actually put out a press release saying what I said wasn’t 

true. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Despite the findings of the inspector general? 

Mr. GERMAN. Right. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. And there has been no criminal prosecution? 

Mr. GERMAN. Right. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Chairman, I would suggest by way of a letter 

from you and the Ranking Member to inquire as to why there has 

been no subsequent action against those who commit crimes, allegedly or purportedly would commit a crime. 

Mr. SCOTT. If the gentleman would yield, I will confer with the 

Ranking Member about that letter. I think it is appropriate. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Chairman, I thank you. 

I think it was you, Mr. German, that indicated that good information was coming from Guantanamo from the agents on the 

ground, so to speak. 

Mr. GERMAN. What I meant was truthful information. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Yesterday I chaired a hearing. I chair the Oversight Committee on Foreign Affairs, and we had a rather extensive, 

expansive hearing on the treatment of detainees at Guantanamo, 

and I commended publicly the FBI for withdrawing and not participating in interrogations that potentially are violative of our international obligations under the conventions against torture, and the 

fact that field agents had that information and passed it up, and 

yet we now we have a new report indicating that the management 

level of the FBI could have done better. I find that disappointing. 

I have great confidence in field agents. I find them hardworking, 

committed Americans that are there to serve their country. How do 

we solve this problem? You know, it is a major occasion here when 

we have an oversight hearing and get the Director before the Committee. I think it has happened twice in the last 7 years. We find 

72 

it as difficult as you do in terms of your frustration, getting the 

necessary information before us so that we can review the behavior 

of this very significant agency. 

I am looking for some suggestions in terms of how do we provide 

protections to those field agents to come to this Committee, the Judiciary Committee, which has oversight jurisdiction of the FBI? Do 

you think it is possible to draft a concept paper for review by the 

Chairman and the Ranking Member that would provide protections 

for field agents to come directly to the U.S. Congress via this particular Committee and provide them full protection, confidentiality 

so that they can give us the realities of what is happening in terms 

of the significant national security and criminal investigations that 

are occurring in this country? Is that something that you think is 

worthy of consideration? 

Mr. GERMAN. I think it absolutely is. I think it is your right to 

have this information, and it is their obligation to provide it to you. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. I hope the two of you in conjunction with others 

would consider that. 

The Chair of the full Committee Mr. Conyers left, but he raised 

the issue or alluded to e-mails. I want to pursue that just for a moment. Can you disclose the nature of those e-mails? I think the 

question was directed to you, Mr. Youssef. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Congressman Delahunt, I feel that I can’t get into 

much detail about the e-mails or the substance of the e-mails because it is a pending inquiry with the Office of the Inspector General right now. But I can characterize them generically as, looking 

at them in chronology and substance, they will give a pretty accurate picture of why these abuses occurred, for one point. 

Beyond that, I feel uncomfortable going into any more detail. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. I respect that, and I would hope and I am sure 

that the Chair of the full Committee and the Chair of the Subcommittee, along with the appropriate Ranking Members would 

pursue this in an in camera proceeding, because it is important 

that this Committee has that information and make a determination after its receipt if it should be made public, because there is 

simply too much at stake here, and what is at stake is the efficient 

and effective operation of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and 

ensuring that employees are being treated with respect and dignity, and that the information that they have is processed in a way 

that protects the national interest, including the national security 

interests of this country. 

With that I yield back the balance of my time. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. If I may make one comment to that, sir. I believe 

that your dogged oversight will prime the system so that legitimate 

whistleblowers will be able to come forward because they will see 

that the current whistleblowers are being protected. However, the 

way that it is going on right now, the current state of affairs for 

what a whistleblower goes through inside the FBI, sends an extremely chilling message to anyone else in the Bureau who wants 

to come forward to explain what is really going on. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Gohmert, I think it is very 

important that there be a thoughtful consideration of and an understanding between your Subcommittee and the full Committee 

with the Director of the FBI about protections for those who wish 

73 

to come forward to this Committee to provide us information which 

has been sorely lacking to this Committee over the past 8 years, 

and probably before that. I don’t want to set any particular time 

frame. And I see that the judge Mr. Gohmert is preparing to ask 

for me to yield on that point. 

I yield. 

Mr. GOHMERT. The thought occurs to me, based on some of the 

things that we have heard here today, that perhaps it would be 

good to just invite FBI agents from time to time for a classified 

briefing and include in there people who may wish to come forward. So it is classified, it is secret. Because obviously if someone 

wants to come forward and talk to this Committee, that ends up 

being a record that can be established. I think there are ways to 

do that. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Whatever the Ranking Member says I am sure 

should be given careful consideration. I obviously defer to the 

Chairman, but we need to provide the kinds of protections necessary so that men and women like these two witnesses feel comfortable coming here and giving us information that we have not 

received in the past, and I am confident are not receiving now. We 

can’t just simply rely on the inspector general to provide us this information. We have got to take a much more aggressive attitude. 

I thank the Chair. 

Mr. SCOTT. I thank you. 

The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Any other comments? 

Mr. GOHMERT. A couple of quick questions. 

Mr. Youssef, talking about the Counterterrorism Unit, you indicated one of the problems also, they are not given adequate tools. 

Can you tell us quickly what tools they need? I think on both sides 

of the aisle we want to make sure that they have the tools that 

they need. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. Thank you, sir. 

I don’t believe that the tools are necessarily financial or budgetary, even though that is always a concern. I believe the tools that 

are needed specifically for the Counterterrorism Division, agents 

and analysts is the appropriate training, the leadership that has 

experience to be able to run and direct the operations of the field 

and the rest of counterterrorism, language training; the very obvious assets that would be needed, for example, if you have agents 

in the field who have worked in the past and have had success in 

recruiting sources in a particular organization—— 

Mr. GOHMERT. Those agents have now gone to the private sector 

because of the 5 year up or out policy, but go ahead. 

Mr. YOUSSEF. That is what we need to come back. 

Mr. GOHMERT. I don’t mean to be flippant, but time is short here. 

I would ask you to submit in writing after the hearing things to 

help the FBI, the Counterterrorism Unit, have what they need to 

do the job to protect America. Obviously there are an awful lot of 

very dedicated, incredibly adept FBI agents. 

Another quick question. We have a different Attorney General 

from one who was in place during some of the time you mentioned. 

It appears to me General Mukasey is trying to do an admirable job 

74 

fighting for truth, justice and the American way. Do you have any 

information to the contrary? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. No, sir, I don’t know the Attorney General personally or in any other—— 

Mr. GOHMERT. Do you have any other information to the contrary? 

Mr. YOUSSEF. No, sir. I was concerned that Attorney General 

Mukasey allowed the FBI to be involved in the inspector general’s 

investigation. My understanding is if you are investigating a target 

of some sort, you don’t involve them in the investigation. It should 

be an independent investigation. That was a concern of mine. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Well, he may not have been aware of the concerns 

previously existing, but now certainly he will be. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

I would like to thank our witnesses for their testimony today. 

Members may have additional written questions for our witnesses, 

which we will forward to you and ask you to answer as promptly 

as you can so the answers may be made part of the record. 

Without objection, the hearing record will remain open for 1 

week for submission of additional materials. 

Without objection, the Subcommittee stands adjourned. Thank 

you very much. 

[Whereupon, at 3:47 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

(75) 

A P P E N D I X 

MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING RECORD

76 


A-1.eps
77 


A-2.eps
78 


A-3.eps
79 

Æ 


A-4.eps