[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 33 (Wednesday, February 25, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2483-S2484]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. GRASSLEY (for himself and Mrs. McCaskill):
  S. 474. A bill to amend the Congressional Accountability Act of 1995 
to apply whistleblower protections available to certain executive 
branch employees to legislative branch employees, and for other 
purposes; to the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental 
Affairs.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I come to introduce another bill as part 
of my Accountability in Government Week. Yesterday I introduced the 
False Claims Act Clarification Act to help restore the original intent 
of the most successful law the Government utilizes to protect 
taxpayers' dollars from fraud, waste, and abuse.
  One key component I added to the False Claims Act when it was amended 
in 1986 was allowing whistleblowers to file cases on behalf of the 
Government when they are aware of fraud or abuse of taxpayers' funds. 
Whistleblowers are the key to unlocking the secrets of wrongdoing 
because they have access to information about how the frauds were 
perpetrated and can help lead authorities in the right direction to 
uncover the fraud. However, for their brave efforts whistleblowers are 
often the victims of retaliation and are removed from their jobs by 
supervisors who do not want the wrongdoing uncovered.
  I have often said whistleblowers were as welcome as skunks at a 
picnic, despite the fact that all they do is bring forward the truth. 
This is wrong. That is why I have supported strong whistleblower 
protection laws during my time in the Congress.
  The landmark whistleblower law is the Whistleblower Protection Act of 
1989--I believe is the year it was passed--providing rights and 
remedies to executive branch whistleblowers who are the victims of 
retaliation. I proudly cosponsored that bill. But like many laws that 
are 20 years old, it needs to be updated. So I have cosponsored 
legislation introduced by Democratic Senator Akaka to do just that. 
However, that law also needs to be extended to employees of the 
legislative and judicial branches of Government. So I come today to 
start the discussion and to introduce legislation that will provide the 
same whistleblower protection rights currently extended to executive 
branch employees to the legislative branch.
  I am pleased to be joined by Senator McCaskill in introducing the 
Congressional Whistleblower Protection Act of 2009. This important 
legislation simply adds whistleblower protections to the legislative 
branch by incorporating the Whistleblower Protection Act into the 
Congressional Accountability Act of 1995, a law that I authored to 
bring Congress in line with many labor and workplace practices that 
affected businesses around the country because I have long believed 
Congress should practice what it preaches. This legislation will do 
just that.
  You might remember the Congressional Accountability Act was passed 
because, going back to the 1930s, Congress had exempted itself from a 
lot of employment laws because we individual Senators are employers, 
the Congress is an employer, but we exempted ourselves from, I think, 
18, 19 different laws at that particular time.
  So in 1995 I wanted to end the proposition of why we had two sets of 
laws in this country--one for Capitol Hill and one for the rest of the 
country. Now, since 1995, we have one set of laws, but we do not have 
the whistleblower protections that ought to be in it.
  A theme that has dominated this new Congress, as well as dominated 
the campaign of last fall, is accountability and responsibility in 
Washington. In most instances, the only reason we discovered waste or 
fraud is because employees were brave enough to stand up to the 
wrongdoers and to expose the offenses. Without these whistleblowers, 
the American taxpayer would continue to foot a bill that might be a 
violation of law, might be fraudulent use of taxpayers' money, might 
just be a waste of taxpayer money. Either way, taxpayers are hurt.
  This bill is long overdue. I have previously introduced similar 
legislation, but, unfortunately, those bills were never brought out of 
committee. I hope the Homeland Security and Government Affairs 
Committee, of which the chairman is on the Senate floor--I did not know 
the Senator would be so available for me to preach to him. I hope the 
Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee will examine this 
legislation and will closely and expeditiously report it to the full 
Senate so we can ensure employees of the legislative branch that they 
are protected from any reprisals relating to protected whistleblowing 
the same way as executive branch employees.
  Now, it has been a number of years since the Congressional 
Accountability Act was signed into law. So I would like to remind my 
colleagues why we passed that law. It was a time very similar to today. 
The American people were demanding more from their elected officials in 
Washington and wanted accountability and transparency in all branches 
of Government. I believed then, as I do now, that Congress needs to put 
its money where its mouth is and apply the various labor and employment 
laws that were enforced on other branches of Government and businesses 
all across the country.
  That is what the Congressional Accountability Act did. It applied a 
number of important laws to Congress, including the Fair Labor 
Standards Act, title VII, the Civil Rights Act, the Americans With 
Disabilities Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, Family 
Medical Leave Act, the Occupational Safety and Health Act, Employee 
Polygraph Protection Act, Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification 
Act, the Rehabilitation Act, as well as some provisions of title V 
relating to Federal service labor-management relations. It also created 
the Office of Compliance of the legislative branch that oversees the 
application of these important laws to this branch of Government and 
ensures that employees' rights under these laws are protected.
  While the Congressional Accountability Act was a good start, the 
Office of Compliance has recommended additional laws be applied to the 
legislative branch, including the purpose of my bill, the Whistleblower 
Protection Act.
  We have already taken the steps to protect whistleblowers in the 
executive branch, so it does not make sense not to extend those same 
protections to whistleblowers working right here in our own backyard on 
Capitol Hill. My bill will, very simply, give congressional employees 
the same protections that workers of other branches of Government have. 
It does this by simply adding the Whistleblower Protection Act to the 
preexisting list of statutes that are applied to the legislative branch 
by the Congressional Accountability Act.
  This is a straightforward and simple solution to ensuring that 
employees of the legislative branch are not without vital whistleblower 
protections. So I ask, in closing, that my colleagues join me and 
Senator McCaskill in supporting this bill to ensure that those who help 
us in the fight to hold Government accountable are not punished for 
those efforts.

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