National Whistleblower Center President Stephen M. Kohn hailed the introduction of the bill.
From the website:
"The majority of all civil fraud recoveries in the US are based on whistleblower disclosures. Because of the effectiveness of the False Claims Act, powerful corporate interests have aggressively attacked the law in court, creating loopholes that have undermined the law and cost the taxpayers billions of dollars. The False Claims Act Correction Act is badly needed legislation to stop the hemorrhaging of the public treasury by unscrupulous beltway bandits."
The Legislation is said to correct the following defects in the current law:
• Corrects FCA by removing the requirement that false claims be presented to a government employee. This section corrects longstanding problems that prevented taxpayer recoveries on false claims regarding government money or property. This correction ensures that any government money lost to fraud, waste, or abuse can be recovered using the FCA regardless of whether the individual making the false claim directly represents such a claim to a government employee.
• Congressionally Reverses the Supreme Court decision in Rockwell Int’l Corp. et al. v. United States, which dramatically limited the FCA by restricting legitimate qui tam relators who often bring fraud to the attention of DOJ with information DOJ expands and ultimately settles on other grounds.
• Clarifies, that false or fraudulent claims against non-U.S. Government funds under the trust and control of the U.S. Government are subject to recovery under the FCA. This clarification would ensure funds administered by the U.S. Government on behalf of third party nations or other entities are protected from fraud, waste, or abuse by extending FCA liability to those funds.
• Clarifies a split between Circuit Courts of Appeal as to when a government employee may act as a qui tam relator under the FCA. This clarification would explicitly state in statute the original legislative intent of the 1986 amendments to the FCA allowing government employees to act as qui tam relators in limited circumstances when they have reported activities up the chain of command, to the Inspector General, to the Attorney General, and only if no action was taken after 12 months.
The National Whistleblower Center was established in 1988 as a non-profit and non-partisan organization functioning solely in the public interest, and dedicated to supporting employee whistleblowers.
On August 23, the Center joined a broad coalition of liberal, libertarian and conservative groups including the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition, and the Liberty Coalition in condemning the federal government’s pervasive abuse of the States Secrets Privilege in the case of FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds, and calls for swift action by the U.S. Congress and the courts to stop this constitutional abuse.
NWC President Stephen M. Kohn issued a statement of support of Ms. Edmonds:
"The 'State Secrets' privilege undermines whistleblower protections. Despite the fact that the Department of Justice's own watchdog, the Inspector General, confirmed that Sibel Edmonds had been illegally fired, the government used that alleged 'privilege' to have her case thrown out of court and to cover up FBI wrongdoing. The government abused a 'privilege' to undermine constitutionally protected free speech and ignore an Inspector General's findings of retaliation. Every national security whistleblower was threatened by this improper assertion of a privilege. The National Whistleblower Center joins in asking Congress and the courts to place limits on this privilege so that national security whistleblowers, such as Ms. Edmonds, can expose serious wrongdoing, free from retaliation."
NWC General Counsel, David K. Colapinto also issued a statement in support of Ms. Edmonds, and on the recent developments in her ongoing case:
"This latest revelation proves that throwing Ms. Edmonds' case out of court was a travesty because no state secrets would have been revealed. The dismissal rewarded the FBI wrongdoers and, as the Inspector General found, Ms. Edmonds' whistleblowing was the "most significant factor" in her firing by the FBI. If the courts won't prevent the government from using the State Secrets privilege as a trump card to cover up agency wrongdoing and to defeat meritorious claims, like Ms. Edmonds' whistleblower case, then Congress must act to stop this odious practice."
Stephen Kohn and David Colapinto represented Ms. Edmonds during the OIG investigation, and witnessed first hand the improper use of the State Secrets Privilege in her case.
So far, nine presidential candidates [including two Republicans] have issued statements in response to a NWC survey, all pledging:
"... to advocate for the passage of a law which would give employees who are illegally terminated for blowing the whistle the same procedural and substantive protections as other wrongfully discharged employees under laws such as Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (i.e. the law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of race or sex)."
These same nine candidates have also endorsed:
"... the passage of H.R. 985 (protection for federal employee whistleblowers, expanding whistleblower protection to employee who expose weakness in homeland security, and agreed to strengthen the existing environmental whistleblower protections.)
If we are ever to hear testimony from former federal and civil service personnel like Sibel Edmonds, supporting this organization should be as dutiful an act for a citizen as voting is. The prosperity of the National Whistleblower Center portends the prosperity of democracy in the United States.
Please donate if you can.
William Shakespeare once said: (from the play, "Henry VIII")
"The first thing we do is... kill all the lawyers."
However, contrary to popular belief, I believe Shakespeare's literary proposal was not designed to restore sanity to commercial life of those portrayed in the play. Rather, it was intended to eliminate those who might stand in the way of a contemplated revolution -- thus underscoring the important role that lawyers can play in society.
For the present, I would eliminate the ambiguity of Mr. Shakespeare’s statement by amending it to read instead:
"... befriend all the lawyers," adding, "Take them out for coffee. Share a cab. Open a door. Bring them their morning paper, etc."
We can’t sit on our laurels. Ms. Edmonds case and others must be heard. Please support the NWC, the ACLU and other organizations essential to our democracy.
Peace
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