Political Quotes

“This amendment would eliminate the increase of $596,000 for the Office of Inspector General under the Department of Commerce and apply that amount to the spending reduction account. This amendment has the support of the ranking member of the Subcommittee on Oversight, Representative Maffei, as well. As chairman of the House Science Oversight Subcommittee within the Science, Space, and Technology Committee, I have had the unfortunate responsibility of discovering an incidence of whistleblower intimidation perpetrated by top-level agency employees at the Department of Commerce, Office of Inspector General. Consequently, the Office of Special Counsel was brought in to investigate these allegations of whistleblower retaliation. The investigation in this particular case found that the counsel to the inspector general and the principal assistant inspector general for investigations and whistleblower protection had threatened whistleblowers with an ultimatum: to either sign an agreement to not ``disparage the agency to Congress and their staff, the Office of Special Counsel, and the media'' or have failing performance reviews added to their permanent files. Unfortunately, the Office of Inspector General ignored these findings and took minimal action against these individuals. That is not enough.…”