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may bring an action at law or equity for de novo review 
to seek compensatory damages and other relief available 
under this section in the appropriate district court of the 
United States, which shall have jurisdiction over such an 
action without regard to the amount in controversy, and 
which action shall, at the request of either party to such 
action, be tried by the court with a jury.’’. 
SEC. 12. PROHIBITED PERSONNEL PRACTICES AFFECTING 
THE TRANSPORTATION SECURITY ADMINIS-
TRATION. 
(a) IN GENERAL.—Chapter 23 of title 5, United 
States Code, is amended— 
(1) by redesignating sections 2304 and 2305 as 
sections 2305 and 2306, respectively; and 
(2) by inserting after section 2303a (as inserted 
by section 10) the following: 
‘‘§ 2304. Prohibited personnel practices affecting the 
Transportation Security Administration 
‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—Notwithstanding any other pro-
vision of law, any individual holding or applying for a posi-
tion within the Transportation Security Administration 
shall be covered by— 
‘‘(1) the provisions of section 2302(b)(1), (8), 
and (9); 
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‘‘(2) any provision of law implementing section 
2302(b)(1), (8), or (9) by providing any right or 
remedy available to an employee or applicant for em-
ployment in the civil service; and 
‘‘(3) any rule or regulation prescribed under 
any provision of law referred to in paragraph (1) or 
(2). 
‘‘(b) RULE OF CONSTRUCTION.—Nothing in this sec-
tion shall be construed to affect any rights, apart from 
those described in subsection (a), to which an individual 
described in subsection (a) might otherwise be entitled 
under law. 
‘‘(c) EFFECTIVE DATE.—This section shall take ef-
fect as of the date of the enactment of this section.’’. 
(b) CLERICAL AMENDMENT.—The table of sections 
for chapter 23 of title 5, United States Code, is amended 
by striking the items relating to sections 2304 and 2305, 
respectively, and by inserting the following: 
‘‘2304. Prohibited personnel practices affecting the Transportation Security Ad-
ministration. 
‘‘2305. Responsibility of the Government Accountability Office. 
‘‘2306. Coordination with certain other provisions of law.’’. 
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SEC. 13. CLARIFICATION OF WHISTLEBLOWER RIGHTS RE-
LATING TO SCIENTIFIC AND OTHER RE-
SEARCH. 
(a) IN GENERAL.—Section 2302 of title 5, United 
States Code, is amended by adding at the end the fol-
lowing: 
‘‘(f) As used in section 2302(b)(8), the term ‘abuse 
of authority’ includes— 
‘‘(1) any action that compromises the validity 
or accuracy of federally funded research or analysis; 
‘‘(2) the dissemination of false or misleading 
scientific, medical, or technical information; 
‘‘(3) any action that restricts or prevents an 
employee or any person performing federally funded 
research or analysis from publishing in peer-reviewed 
journals or other scientific publications or making 
oral presentations at professional society meetings or 
other meetings of their peers; and 
‘‘(4) any action that discriminates for or 
against any employee or applicant for employment 
on the basis of religion, as defined by section 13(b) 
of the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act of 
2007.’’. 
(b) DEFINITION.—As used in section 2302(f)(3) of 
title 5, United States Code (as amended by subsection 
(a)), the term ‘‘on the basis of religion’’ means— 
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(1) prohibiting personal religious expression by 
Federal employees to the greatest extent possible, 
consistent with requirements of law and interests in 
workplace efficiency; 
(2) requiring religious participation or non-par-
ticipation as a condition of employment, or permit-
ting religious harassment; 
(3) failing to accommodate employees’ exercise 
of their religion; 
(4) failing to treat all employees with the same 
respect and consideration, regardless of their religion 
(or lack thereof); 
(5) restricting personal religious expression by 
employees in the Federal workplace except where the 
employee’s interest in the expression is outweighed 
by the government’s interest in the efficient provi-
sion of public services or where the expression in-
trudes upon the legitimate rights of other employees 
or creates the appearance, to a reasonable observer, 
of an official endorsement of religion; 
(6) regulating employees’ personal religious ex-
pression on the basis of its content or viewpoint, or 
suppressing employees’ private religious speech in 
the workplace while leaving unregulated other pri-
vate employee speech that has a comparable effect 
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on the efficiency of the workplace, including ideolog-
ical speech on politics and other topics; 
(7) failing to exercise their authority in an 
evenhanded and restrained manner, and with regard 
for the fact that Americans are used to expressions 
of disagreement on controversial subjects, including 
religious ones; 
(8) failing to permit an employee to engage in 
private religious expression in personal work areas 
not regularly open to the public to the same extent 
that they may engage in nonreligious private expres-
sion, subject to reasonable content- and viewpoint- 
neutral standards and restrictions; 
(9) failing to permit an employee to engage in 
religious expression with fellow employees, to the 
same extent that they may engage in comparable 
nonreligious private expression, subject to reasonable 
and content-neutral standards and restrictions; 
(10) failing to permit an employee to engage in 
religious expression directed at fellow employees, and 
may even attempt to persuade fellow employees of 
the correctness of their religious views, to the same 
extent as those employees may engage in comparable 
speech not involving religion; 
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(11) inhibiting an employee from urging a col-
league to participate or not to participate in reli-
gious activities to the same extent that, consistent 
with concerns of workplace efficiency, they may urge 
their colleagues to engage in or refrain from other 
personal endeavors, except that the employee must 
refrain from such expression when a fellow employee 
asks that it stop or otherwise demonstrates that it 
is unwelcome; 
(12) failing to prohibit expression that is part 
of a larger pattern of verbal attacks on fellow em-
ployees (or a specific employee) not sharing the faith 
of the speaker; 
(13) preventing an employee from— 
(A) wearing personal religious jewelry ab-
sent special circumstances (such as safety con-
cerns) that might require a ban on all similar 
nonreligious jewelry; or 
(B) displaying religious art and literature 
in their personal work areas to the same extent 
that they may display other art and literature, 
so long as the viewing public would reasonably 
understand the religious expression to be that 
of the employee acting in her personal capacity, 
and not that of the government itself; 
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(16) prohibiting a supervisor’s religious expres-
sion where it is not coercive and is understood to be 
his or her personal view, in the same way and to the 
same extent as other constitutionally valued speech; 
(17) permitting a hostile environment, or reli-
gious harassment, in the form of religiously discrimi-
natory intimidation, or pervasive or severe religious 
ridicule or insult, whether by supervisors or fellow 
workers, as determined by its frequency or repet-
itiveness, and severity; 
(18) failing to accommodate an employee’s exer-
cise of their religion unless such accommodation 
would impose an undue hardship on the conduct of 
the agency’s operations, based on real rather than 
speculative 
or 
hypothetical 
cost 
and 
without 
disfavoring other, nonreligious accommodations; and 
(19) in those cases where an agency’s work rule 
imposes a substantial burden on a particular em-
ployee’s exercise of religion, failing to grant the em-
ployee an exemption from that rule, absent a com-
pelling interest in denying the exemption and where 
there is no less restrictive means of furthering that 
interest. 
(c) RULE OF CONSTRUCTION.—Nothing in this sec-
tion shall be construed to create any new right, benefit, 
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or trust responsibility, substantive or procedural, enforce-
able at law or equity by a party against the United States, 
its agencies, its officers, or any person. 
SEC. 14. EFFECTIVE DATE. 
This Act shall take effect 30 days after the date of 
the enactment of this Act, except as provided in the 
amendment made by section 12(a)(2). 
Passed the House of Representatives March 14, 
2007. 
Attest: 
LORRAINE C. MILLER, 
Clerk. 
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