This may have flown under your radar

 

February 7, 2022

Editor’s Note: We’re experiencing some technical difficulties, which forced us to postpone sending this newsletter until today. We’re sorry for the delay, and we hope to be back on our regular schedule later this week. We saw some great news last week that may have flown under your radar. A key Senate committee has now approved three nominees to the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB), setting the nominees up for a vote in the full Senate. If all three are approved, the board will have a quorum for the first time in five years. The MSPB is an agency that helps manage government whistleblowers’ claims that they have been retaliated against. And without a quorum, the MSPB is unable to grant those whistleblowers temporary relief or a final judgement on their claims of retaliation. It currently has a backlog of around 3,600 cases. The board is finally very close to being able to function again and provide much needed aid for whistleblowers who have been retaliated against for telling the truth. We hope to have more updates soon on the full vote. ANALYSIS Disclosing Oversight Recommendations: How Are Agencies Doing? New POGO research shows few federal agencies are fully compliant with requirements to disclose recommendations they receive from key government oversight offices. Read More LETTER POGO Submits Second Comment on Creation of New Federal Beneficial Ownership Database If set up well, a beneficial ownership database will help law enforcement agencies prevent bad actors from abusing the U.S. financial system. Read More QUOTE OF THE WEEK “We’re in kind of a post-Watergate era right now in some ways and I think that’s exactly the time you want to do something like a reform of government ethics.” Dylan Hedtler-Gaudette, Government Affairs Manager, in Government Executive WATCHLIST Policy Counsel Melissa Wasser explains why we should care about the movement at the MSPB. ONE LINERS “All of this is stuff that is so insane, any person who has no interest in any of this would clearly say this should be against the rules, but then the people who get in the position to change the rules have these conflicts and they have no interest in solving them.” Walt Shaub, Senior Ethics Fellow, in E&E News   “This kind of review should include looking at places where the Department is inappropriately captured by the defense industry, and these selections show an appalling lack of diversity in perspectives to meaningfully evaluate how these processes continue to result in runaway spending and less bang for the buck.” Mandy Smithberger, Former Director of the Center for Defense Information, in Defense News   “It’s deeply troubling that a Justice of the Supreme Court would participate in something that’s kind of shrouded in secrecy that way.” Sarah Turberville, Director of The Constitution Project at POGO, in Orlando Sentinel   “Even if [Sen. Pat Toomey] did nothing illegal, it just looks really sketchy and really corrupt.” Dylan Hedtler-Gaudette, Government Affairs Manager, in the Philadelphia Inquirer

pogo.org The Project On Government Oversight (POGO) is a nonpartisan independent watchdog that investigates and exposes waste, corruption, abuse of power, and when the government fails to serve the public or silences those who report wrongdoing. We champion reforms to achieve a more effective, ethical, and accountable federal government that safeguards constitutional principles.

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