Senate to Hold Hearing on FBI’s Treatment of Whistleblowers

Washington, D.C. February 27, 2015. The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing entitled “Whistleblower Retaliation at the FBI: Improving Protections and Oversight,” on Wednesday, March 4, 2015, at 10 am in the Committee’s main hearing room, 226 Dirksen. Witnesses include the Department of Justice Inspector General, a current FBI whistleblower and Stephen M. Kohn, Executive Director of the National Whistleblower Center and author of The Whistleblower’s Handbook. According to Kohn, “This hearing will be an eye opener to the internal operations of the FBI.” Mr. Kohn has represented FBI whistleblowers continuously since 1993 and was lead counsel on the case of Whitehurst v. FBI, which compelled President Clinton to order the DOJ to implement whistleblower protections in 1997. Information on two other National Whistleblower Center supported FBI cases is linked here: Jane Turner and Bassem Youssef. The hearing will also review a January 2015 report by the Government Accounting Office entitled “Whistleblower Protection: Additional Actions Needed to Improve DOJ’s Handling of FBI Retaliation Complaints.” This report was highly critical of the Justice Department’s handling of FBI whistleblower cases. For more information about this hearing, visit the Committee’s website.