Date: 2007-03-14
Speaker: TOM DAVIS (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Virginia

Mr. Chairman. today. we take up the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act of 2007. This legislation would modernize. clarify. and expand the laws protecting Federal employees who blow the whistle on waste. fraud. and mismanagement in the Federal Government. *At the outset. I think it is important to thank my colleague from* Pennsylvania . Throughout this process. Mr. PLATTS has .been an unwavering advocate for Federal employees. This bill would not exist today in this form if not for his steady leadership. Almost immediately �following the 1994 changes in the Whistleblower Protection Act. it became clear that the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals would continue to create loopholes where no loopholes were intended and dilute protections for vhistleblowers Congress clearly intended to protect. This bill we are considering today develops a new regime governing whistleblower protections and offers fresh solutions to the continuing problem of employee retaliation. I am proud this legislation would allow Federal employees and contractor personnel to pursue their claims in the Federal district court. to be heard before a jury of their peers. if no action is taken by the Merit Systems Protection Board within 180 days. Under current law. cases filed by employees who believe they have been retaliated against for blowing a whistle can sometimes end up languishing before the MSPB for years before a final decision is issued. H.R. 985 would change the process and allow Federal employees to reach resolution on this issue one way .or the other. I am disappointed. however. the Rules Committee did not make in order my amendment to remove from the bill language which would provide for an "all circuits" review of whistleblower claims. My amendment would have tried to maintain the uniformity in the consideration of whistleblower cases in the Federal courts by keeping in place the current requirement that all whistleblower appeals go through the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. rather than opening up appeals to all circuits. Without my amendment. Federal employee whistleblowers could end up possessing a different set of rights and protections based on where they file their claim. For example. a Border Patrol agent in Texas could beprotected by a different set of whistleblower protections than a Border Patrol agent in Maine. I think the underlying legislation already provides sufficient reforms to the Whistleblower protection laws by revising the statute under which the Federal Circuit reviews whistleblower claims. Going further in this legislation. removing the requirement that all appeals must go through one Federal appeals court. is going to. in the long term. be counterproductive to our policies governing Federal employment. I am also interested in the amendment dealing with national security whistleblowers Mr. HOEKSTRA filed at Rules. but was not made in order. While I. supported the language Mr. HOEKSTRAS amendment sought " to strike. I understand many members from the intelligencerelated committees and officials in the intelligence community have concerns which I believe need to be addressed before this bill moves on to the Senate. One additional concern I would like to mention is with section 13 of the bill. Section 13 would open a whole new area of personnel conflicts to whistleblower protections. This new language. added to the bill this year. would make influencing federally funded scientific research a prohibited personnel practice by specifically identifying the dissemination of false -or misleading scientific or medical or technical - information as an "abuse of an auifiority" that is actionable in Federal court. Rather than acknowledging the natural and perfectly healthy tension that exists between science and policymaking. this section would submit the "science versus ethics" issue to the Federal courts to be litigated as a personnel issue. Unlike many on the Democratic side of the aisle who believe only scientific findings should serve as the foundation for public policy and decisionmaking. I believe science is just one cog in the policy decisionmaking process. Science must be balanced against factors such as the morals of our society and the ethics of individual policymakers. as well as countless other policy considerations. As I have said before. I dont believe we should turn the tension between science and policymaking into a personnel matter that gets litigated by the courts. In closing. I believe the underlying legislation makes a number of important positive contributions to Federal whistleblower policy. and I support this bill. While I believe we can still make a few refinements to the bill to make it better. I applaud Mr. PLATS and Mr. WAXMANs efforts to move this bill forward. Mr. Chairman. I reserve the balance of our time.