00:00I would say 95% of the whistleblowers really think they're going to get a handshake for reporting a violation.
00:05It's like, no, you're going to get a knife in your back.
00:09You see it in the headlines.
00:12Whistleblowers coming forward.
00:14But will blowing the whistle put their own livelihood or lives at risk?
00:19When the whistleblower comes into our office, they're so stressed, and they should be, and anxious.
00:26They should be.
00:26The public recently learned more on the digital footprint of the man who attempted to assassinate President Trump at the Butler, Pennsylvania, rally.
00:36A trove of information regarding Thomas Crook's social media accounts, including never-before-seen photos and videos appearing to show Crooks with a gun.
00:46All of these new details in the case were brought to light by a whistleblower.
00:50And it got us thinking, how does the whistleblower process actually work behind the scenes?
00:58Today, we're talking to Stephen Cohn, who helped found the National Whistleblower Center.
01:03He has spent decades representing whistleblowers and has helped in the evolution of whistleblower legal protections.
01:11Now, whistleblowing always has a lot of risk.
01:17It's inherent.
01:19But by keeping confidential, following the laws, being smart, you do have a really strong opportunity to end up on top.
01:29Cohn has seen whistleblower protections in the United States evolve over the last several decades.
01:36I started in 1984. None of the laws I used then do I use now. None. Zero. None of them existed.
01:46Since then, Cohn says laws have strengthened, and some of them he has personally had a hand in.
01:53But these sort of protections are still complex compared to others.
01:57One thing that confuses people, we don't have one whistleblower law in the United States.
02:03Like, if you're a victim, say, of discrimination based on race or sex, there's a national law known as Title VII, and the lawyers know how to use it.
02:15It's well-established.
02:17In whistleblower, there's about 65 different laws.
02:20They came up scandal by scandal.
02:23Many whistleblower laws are reactive, meaning they only came about after a scandal or crisis occurred.
02:31In response to several deadly airplane crashes, like a ValueJet plane crash in 1996 and an Alaska Airlines crash in 2000,
02:41Congress passed laws improving safety oversight and added protections for aviation whistleblowers.
02:48Safety concerns within nuclear facilities prompted similar safeguards in the energy sector.
02:55Or take the 2008 financial crisis.
02:58This led to the Dodd-Frank Act creating whistleblower protections on Wall Street for reporting fraud.
03:06These are examples of Congress reacting to specific industry failures by creating safeguards for insiders to sound the alarm.
03:14It's massively confusing.
03:1692% of all whistleblowers who suffer retaliation did not use the proper filing procedures.
03:26The moment you don't use the proper filing procedures, you are open to bad things.
03:34Whistleblower protections in the United States differ a lot between government and private sector workers.
03:41Federal employees have broad legal protections.
03:44Private sector workers have more limited protections.
03:48But many whistleblower programs offer financial rewards for exposing wrongdoing.
03:54So while the stereotype or typical good-for-TV narrative is whistleblower versus the government,
04:01sometimes they work hand-in-hand.
04:03My largest case ever, which is confidential, because the company did not know there was a whistleblower.
04:15And you're talking multi-billion dollar sanctions, multi-year investigation.
04:20Because I was able to take the whistleblower in confidentially and anonymously.
04:25The government agreed to all of the restrictions on revealing evidence, on revealing identity, where we conducted interviews.
04:36So as they built their case, the fact that they had an insider was never revealed.
04:44So the company never knew.
04:46So the company never did like a witch hunt to find out who the source was.
04:50And my guy wins, gets very significant compensation.
04:56The government wins, they're able to hold the people accountable.
04:59And that's how it should work today.
05:03But media involvement can complicate things.
05:07If the whistleblower goes to the media, they can lose all their rights fairly quickly.
05:12So they have to be smart to protect them.
05:15And though a story may name you as anonymous, that is not a guaranteed protection.
05:21If the only protection you have is as an anonymous source to the press, it's fairly weak.
05:28There is no federal shield law.
05:31Meaning if courts get involved, journalists can be forced to name their sources.
05:35If you're afraid of the government coming in and issuing subpoenas or grand jury trying to throw you in jail, which they can do, there's a way to circumvent that by using these anonymous and confidential programs.
05:51One toll government whistleblowers have if they want to go to the press is what's called pre-publication.
05:57There's this pre-publication clearance procedure, which immunizes you.
06:02Many people, most whistleblowers I know, do not use that.
06:05Our whistleblowers do.
06:07If I have a whistleblower with security clearance, they want to go forward with something, let's use pre-publication.
06:13Just so they don't get in trouble.
06:16While there are laws to protect government whistleblowers and whistleblowers in other specific industries,
06:22Cohn says the laws need to catch up to modern times.
06:26There's no whistleblower protections for AI.
06:30So if you look at the risks that everyone has said could occur, and it's not to say we're anti-AI at all,
06:38but all of the experts and the companies themselves have looked at chemical warfare, fraud.
06:45They've said it could cause an extinction event.
06:47I mean, the potential risks, there's no law, no whistleblower rights.
06:53So if someone's working for this multi-billion dollar AI company, and they think they're about to unleash something that could stimulate chemical,
07:01you know, let terrorists make chemical bombs, and they want to report it, they don't have any protection under federal law.
07:07Whistleblowers can play an important role, but it's a tricky one.
07:13They may want to shine a light on wrongdoing, safety risks, or fraud, but the path is complicated, and the risks are real.
07:22Whether you're inside government, corporate America, or emerging industries like AI,
07:27knowing the rules can mean the difference between protection and retaliation.
07:33A big thank you to Stephen for taking the time to talk with us and for sharing his expertise for this story.
07:39I know I learned a lot from our conversation, so I hope you also were able to take away something new.
07:46Thank you so much for watching our story.
07:48For more stories that matter to you, be sure to download the Straight Arrow News mobile app or visit us online at san.com.
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