Executive Session

Floor Speech

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Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I rise to oppose the confirmation of William Evanina, whom we will be voting on shortly. Because of his failure to protect whistleblowers, leading whistleblower protection organizations support the opposition to Mr. Evanina's confirmation.

Sen. Wyden's opposition comes days after Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA) lifted his 2018 hold on Mr. Evanina, placed in part because ``Mr. Evanina was responsible for developing policies and procedures to address retaliatory security clearance actions'' taken against whistleblowers. Mr. Evanina has yet to produce those policies and procedures, leaving government investigators with little guidance.

Government Accountability Project's National Security Analyst Irvin McCullough said,

``Losing your security clearance means losing your livelihood for many Intelligence Community employees. These folks' whistleblowing protections were specifically designed to give special care to whistleblowers whose security clearances are revoked in retaliation for making protected disclosures. However, the Director of National Intelligence never implemented uniform policies and procedures for these whistleblowers, meaning agencies can act as their own fiefdoms when adjudicating these complaints. While a whistleblower at the CIA has the same rights as a whistleblower at the NSA, one may find it much harder to enforce their rights simply because their agency is free to apply harsher standards than the other. That is unacceptable. Bill Evanina was directed to issue universal guidance for all agencies to follow when investigating these types of retaliation complaints, but he hasn't done it. While Mr. Evanina is a dedicated public servant who has contributed greatly to our country's national security, this is his job and he needs to do it. We thank Senator Wyden for taking a stand to protect whistleblowers and ensure accountability inside the Intelligence Community.''

Contact: Andrew Harman, Communications Director. ____

Statement from Liz Hempowicz, Director of Public Policy, Project On Government Oversight

``POGO commends Senator Wyden for standing up for whistleblowers by refusing to confirm Mr. Evanina until this critical issue is resolved. Any security clearance action must be based on the national interests of our country, not personal bias or retaliation. Retaliatory security clearance actions undermine the security clearance process, this is why Congress made it unlawful to retaliate against a whistleblower by restricting their access to classified information. ODNI charged Mr. Evanina's office with the creation of uniform guidance for investigating retaliatory actions, but he has failed to fulfil that mandate even after several years. Thank you to Senator Wyden for standing up for whistleblowers and their right to a fair and equal investigation.''

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Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, it is currently open season on whistleblowers under the Trump administration. Donald Trump and those around him have made it clear that anyone who speaks up about waste, fraud, abuse, or lawbreaking can be punished. If you are a whistleblower under the Trump administration, Donald Trump himself and his echo chamber will publicly call you a liar. They will threaten to make your name public, even at the cost of your physical security. They will prevent your complaints from getting to the Congress, and they will fire the inspectors general who investigate your complaints.

Now, more than ever, courageous whistleblowers deserve leaders who are going to protect them, defend them, and vigorously advocate and work for them. They deserve leaders who are going to stand up to Donald Trump and anybody else who tries to punish those who are going to speak truth--truth, especially, to those in power.

I am rising today, taking this time of the Senate, to speak on behalf of whistleblowers who feel under siege right now. I am on the floor to oppose the confirmation of William Evanina's track record of inaction and why he should not be the Director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center.

The fact is that Mr. Evanina has failed, repeatedly, the key test on protecting whistleblower rights. Specifically, he failed to enact whistleblower protections that the Congress required in 2014. Think about that--all those years to get the job done and he didn't do it. That is a 6-year track record of letting down whistleblowers and failing to follow the law.

Today, Congress ought to stand up for whistleblowers, protect our democracy, and the rule of law. And when Congress does act and pass whistleblowers' protection legislation the way this body did in 2014, the Congress must not reward those who ignore the whistleblower protection laws. Here, you have a case of exactly that, refusal to implement it for almost 6 years, and the person we are discussing with that track record of not being there for whistleblowers at a crucial time is being considered for a job promotion in the Senate.

I want to unpack, for a few minutes, what the world looks like now to a potential whistleblower in today's intelligence community. One of the biggest threats faced by whistleblowers who work with classified information is that their bosses are going to retaliate against them by revoking their security clearances. Without clearances, they can't do their jobs, their livelihoods are ruined, and their families suffer. That threat has a chilling effect on potential whistleblowers and makes it less likely that abuses are going to be investigated and brought to light.

The Congress has cared about this for years. It is why, in 2014, the Congress passed legislation specifically prohibiting the revocation of security clearances as a form of retaliation against whistleblowers.

Here is what the questions were. What happens if a whistleblower's boss simply insists that they revoked the clearance for some other reason? What if they say it wasn't retaliation for being a whistleblower? Does the whistleblower have any recourse? Is there an appeals process? Or are whistleblowers, who stick their neck out to report waste, fraud, and abuse, just out of luck?

The Congress then stood with whistleblowers. In that same 2014 law, Congress required the Director of National Intelligence, in consultation with the Attorney General and the Secretary of Defense, to develop and implement policies and practices to make that appeals process for whistleblowers a reality. In other words, the Congress recognized that if whistleblowers were truly going to be protected from retaliation, there had to be a meaningful process for them to defend themselves against agencies that always have all the power and always have an obvious incentive to silence and remove those who speak up about abuses

This important law was passed by Congress in July 2014. As of that day in 2014, the Director of National Intelligence should have been drafting those policies, but they didn't do it in 2014, or in 2015, or in 2016, or in 2017, or 2018, or 2019--all those years of inaction--and certainly they haven't done it in 2020, especially because of the pandemic, because this is a crucial time when whistleblower protection is needed, now more than ever, because we need those folks to be speaking truth to policymakers.

I ask the Senate: Who is at the helm every single one of those years of inaction? The person the Senate is thinking about promoting today, William Evanina. Six years have passed, and Mr. Evanina has not produced those whistleblower protection policies required by law.

During that time, there had been five Directors of National Intelligence. The Congress made the Director of the NCSC a Senate- confirmed position. Mr. Evanina kept his job, becoming both Acting Director and the nominee. Meanwhile, Congress reached out to ask: What is the story on these policies? Is anybody actually moving to protect the whistleblowers, as Congress required in 2014?

I want to say it again. On Mr. Evanina's watch, nothing happened in 2014, nothing happened in 2015, nothing happened in 2016, and nothing happened in 2017, 2018, 2019, and not in 2020--no policies, lots of empty rhetoric and no policies. Without the actual policies, whistleblowers are vulnerable, and when they tell the truth and push for accountability, they suffer.

Every day, Donald Trump steps up his attacks on whistleblowers, on inspectors general, and on the whole system of accountability that has traditionally been bipartisan. Congress has pushed back, passing laws to protect whistleblowers, but the laws have to mean something for the sake of whistleblowers and the rule of law. Congress should not reward those who ignore the law and leave whistleblowers vulnerable. That is what Mr. Evanina has done for 6 years. That is why I cannot support his confirmation. He has defied the law and failed to protect whistleblowers.

I am going to state the obvious. When the Congress passes a law, it has to be implemented. When Congress directs the government to protect whistleblowers, that is something that is priority business. In 2014, this body tried to protect whistleblowers. A law was passed. Mr. Evanina has ignored it all these years. That is just not acceptable.

Now, with Donald Trump and his administration feeling free to publicly attack whistleblowers again and again and conduct an unremitting assault on the entire whistleblower system, laws to protect them are especially important to our democracy. Day after day, we see the costs of a campaign to silence people who speak up about abuses. We see it in his efforts to cover up his failed, often corrupt, responses to the COVID-19 crisis. We see it across the board.

Now is when this country needs officials who are going to demonstrate leadership, who are going to stand up for the brave and the people who are willing to put their neck out to report misconduct. Whistleblowers deserve it, and the country deserves it.

Now, the last point I am going to make--my colleagues probably have heard it, and they are going to hear it, I believe, again--is that Mr. Evanina is going to promise once more, after 6 years of empty promises, to complete these critical whistleblower protection policies. What I would ask Senators is this: Enough is enough, right? After 6 years--6 years of unfulfilled promises--the Senate ought to say: The country deserves better. The country deserves action, and the country deserves real protection for whistleblowers.

Mr. Evanina remains the Acting Director. I want him--even after he hasn't done it for 6 years, I want him to complete those whistleblower protection policies. When they are completed and the law Congress passed is implemented, it seems to me that is the time for the Senate to discuss again whether Mr. Evanina should get a promotion.

Now, last, I just want to come back to how I started. I am not the only one who feels this way. The country's leading whistleblower organizations have made it clear they oppose Mr. Evanina's confirmation due to his failure to produce policies. They include such organizations as the Government Accountability Project, the Project on Government Oversight, Whistleblower Aid, and National Security Counselors. It is not just one Member of the U.S. Senate who is here to say that it is time to finally ensure that these courageous Americans, these patriots, who are willing to come forward when all the incentives in American Government are to stay quiet, not put yourself at risk, don't put your career in jeopardy--when all the incentives are for them to stay quiet, in this country right now, we need them speaking truth more than ever before.

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