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Floor Speech

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Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, today, I come here to speak about one of my favorite topics: protecting patriotic people that we call whistleblowers, people whose goal is, in government, to make sure that laws are faithfully enforced and money spent according to the way it should be, and sometimes these whistleblowers pay a price for doing that, even losing their job and ruining themselves professionally.

I have conducted longstanding oversight to ensure the Federal Government complies with whistleblower protection laws, and some of those laws I have gotten on the books.

Unfortunately, elements of the Federal Government--whether Republican or Democrat--have made efforts to silence whistleblowers through illegal nondisclosure agreements.

Let's not forget that in addition to Federal statute, a fundamental precept of whistleblowing is the First Amendment, freedom of speech. That is why I spearheaded a very successful effort to get what is called anti-gag provisions enacted in the law. I worked a very long time to make anti-gag provisions law. The anti-gag provisions require all Federal Agency nondisclosure policy forms and agreements to notify employees of their right to blow the whistle to Congress, to inspectors general, and to the Office of Special Counsel.

The failure to comply with the law isn't only a chilling effect that discourages whistleblowers, it is also illegal.

For decades, my oversight efforts have successfully led Federal Agencies bringing their unlawful nondisclosure and similar agreements into compliance. And I will tell you this: It is amazing that after all these years, the Federal Government still--still--has problems with compliance with my anti-gag legislation.

That is why Congress must continue to do constant oversight.

So this is what brings me to the floor today. On May 26, this year, the Office of Personnel Management--OPM for short--published a notice with requests for comment in the Federal Register. That notice announced that OPM created a draft nondisclosure agreement form for use by Federal Agencies for both new and existing employees.

According to the Office of Personnel Management, this governmentwide nondisclosure agreement is needed to protect confidential information from unauthorized disclosure. In other words, this new proposed regulation is supposed to stop what we call leaks in this town. Office of Personnel Management provided examples of recent leaks to the media about law enforcement and military operations that put the lives of our Federal officers and military members at risk.

It is truly unacceptable when the unauthorized disclosure of information puts the lives of law enforcement and military personnel at risk. Full stop.

It is important to note the distinction between leaks and whistleblowers. Legally protected whistleblower disclosures are not leaks. Legally protected whistleblower disclosures aren't unauthorized disclosures. It can be a fact-specific analysis to determine which side of the line a disclosure falls on. But during that analysis, the benefit must be given to the patriotic whistleblower.

Now, turning to the text of the Office of Personnel Management draft disclosure form, it works this way: It contains an anti-gag provision but doesn't include the full text as required by law. So it should have the full text of the law that got passed. It fails, also, to include that disclosures to the Office of Special Counsel are allowed. And that is in the law as well.

Further, the anti-gag provisions are at the very beginning of the form rather than at the end like other government nondisclosure agreements, where people that are signing the agreement know what their rights are. As a general matter, I am concerned about the use of nondisclosure agreements because they can chill whistleblowers, even if that is not the intent of the nondisclosure agreement.

I demand that the anti-gag provisions be put at the end, where employees sign. At the end will provide the employee with the mental assurance that they are not giving up their whistleblower rights.

Again, the balance must always be on the benefit of the whistleblower because we shouldn't be doing anything in this government to discourage honest whistleblowing.

As I continue to analyze the draft rule this month, 2026, I wrote to the Office of Personnel Management Director making clear that they need to immediately fix these preliminary issues, have the nondisclosure just above the signature, mention the Office of Special Counsel, and also put the entire language of the legislation in the document.

If the draft nondisclosure form is implemented, Congress, of course, should follow up with oversight to ensure that it is not used inappropriately.

And this Senator intends to do that oversight for sure.

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