By Joe Davidson
Wednesday, September 24, 2008; D04

Amid the swirl of activity on Capitol Hill surrounding legislation for a $700 billion bailout of financial giants is a little-noticed effort to protect Frank and Flo Fed if they reveal things their agencies are doing wrong.

Good-government groups have long wanted to strengthen protection for whistle-blowers and they had a good chance to get such legislation passed before the financial markets took a dive. Now that all the attention is on rushing the bailout through Congress, those groups are trying to get on board.

Concerned the FBI is already following proposed guidelines

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT:(202) 675-2312 or media@dcaclu.org

Congress is busy dealing with the current financial crisis, but it is not so busy that Congress can neglect other pressing priorities like passing a strong federal whistleblower protection bill (especially since comprehensive whistleblower protections are essential to avoid the kind of corruption that has gotten America into this crisis).

The House and the Senate passed bills to protect federal employees who blow the whistle on waste, fraud and abuse by veto proof margins last year (H.R. 985, S. 274), but have yet to agree on a final bill.