‘Whistleblower’ Never Disclosed Contact with House Intel Panel to Inspector General

In a statement earlier this week, a spokesperson for the House Intelligence panel acknowledged Schiff’s response to Stein’s question “should have been more carefully phrased.”

“Regarding Chairman Schiff’s comments on ‘Morning Joe,’ in the context, he intended to answer the question of whether the Committee had heard testimony from the whistleblower, which they had not,” said the spokesperson. “As he said in his answer, the whistleblower was then awaiting instructions from the acting [director of national intelligence] as to how the whistleblower could contact the Committee. Nonetheless he acknowledges that his statement should have been more carefully phrased to make that distinction clear.”

President Trump reacted Friday to Herridge’s report, tweeting: “WOW, this is big stuff!”

WOW, this is big stuff! https://t.co/H12yxMfua3

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 4, 2019

The report raises further questions about both the CIA officer and his complaint. As Breitbart News reported, the so-called “whistleblower” failed to follow the law for protecting intelligence community members seeking to report wrongdoing by contacting the House Intelligence Committee before the Intelligence Community inspector general:

Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act (ICWPA) of 1998 explicitly requires an official concerned about wrongdoing within the government to go to the IC inspector general before the congressional panels in charge of oversight of the intelligence community.

[…]

The employee may contact the congressional intelligence committees directly as described in clause (i) only if the employee –

• a. before making such a contact, furnishes to the DNI, through the IC IG, a statement of the employee’s complaint or information and notice of the employee’s intent to contact the congressional intelligence committees directly; and
• b. obtains and follows from the DNI, through the IC IG, direction on how to contact the congressional intelligence committees in accordance with necessary and appropriate security procedures.

And yet, the officer’s failure to follow whistleblower laws isn’t the only red flag. The Inspector General found that the officer’s complaint was not only based on second-hand information, but that the officer also possessed a “political bias” in favor of a “political rival” of President Trump. CNN reported on Thursday that the officer is a registered Democrat.

Story cited here.

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