Hearing will come to order. I welcome everybody to this hybrid hearing. Both Ranking Member mister heiss and myself have wanted to have hearings resume in person. Especially when we are in session i made a promise to mister heiss that i would fight for that and today is the fruit of that effort i believe when we were in session, to the extent possible, protecting everybodys health and safety, we can and should be meeting like this. At least in hybrid form those members who are not comfortable or who physically cannot join us in the hearing room are more than welcome to join us through the web. We are happy to have them. We ask everybody, when they are not speaking, to wear a mask that is the guidance and the capitol hill position. That is the guidance of the chairwoman of this committee. It protects everybody i really appreciate that cooperation. Let me see. For members appearing remotely, just a few reminders before i get my Opening Statement. House rules require that we see you so pl
Do we ask everyone to turn on their cameras . Were getting ready to get started. The hearing will come to order. I welcome everybody to this hybrid hearing. Both ranks member mr. Hysse and myself have wanted to have hearings resume in person especially when we are in session. I made a promise that i would fight for that, and today is the fruit of that effort. I believe when were in session protecting everybody, those who are not comfortable or physically cannot join us in the hearings room, are more than welcome to join us through web i no noor. We ask everybody when they were not speaking, to wear a mask. I really appreciate that cooperation of for members appears remotely. House rules require that we see you, so police have your cameras turned on at all times during the course of the hearing. If they can let us you can use the chat function to send a request. And if that doesnt work, you can unmute and seek recognition. These arent ideal circumstances, but we are in the midst of a pa
Whistleblower and currently Senior Research fellow at the cato institute. Thank you for being here. Lets talk about your story. Why did you become a whistleblower during the gulf war . Guest those of us whove actually been through this kind of experience when you look at different whistleblower cases, a lot of commonalities come out and theres a new book out, whistleblowing in age of fraud by my friend entered was tom mueller. He takes you through these cases and i briefly mentioned there in connection with another episode of what you buy with most whistleblowers is they tend to be very interdirected. You tend to have a loyalty essentially to a higher purpose or calling and and i spent 26 s in government either fulltime or pipe parttime service between the National Guard and the cia, my ten plus years on capitol hill. Ive taken the same oath about five times in my life to preserve and protect and defend the constitution. I take deadly seriously. I will to that i die and thats what drov
Of conscience whistleblowing in an age of fraud. He takes you through these cases. What you find with most whistleblowers is they tend to be very interdirected. You tend to have a loyalty essentially to a higher purpose or calling. I have spent 26 years in government either full or parttime service between the national guard, the cia, 10 plus. Ears on capitol hill and so on i take it deadly seriously, i will until the day i die and that is what drove me in that circumstance because it was very clear during the war there was an amount of intelligence flowing out of the theater in the early days of the conflict potentialated chemical agent attacks had taken place or alarms had been going off. I was working at the equivalent imagery Headline News operation at the time, very. Uick turnaround reporting every time during that war, that six week period these reports , we would call the headquarters in riyadh and asked the question is this real . Every time, we would be called false alarm, don
Think we want to start. You should eat because youre going to be doing a lot of talking. Good morning, im linda feldman, Washington Bureau chief of the Christian Science monitor. Our guest today is ken cuccinelli, acting director of the u. S. Bureau of citizenship and Immigration Services, and this is his first appearance at a monitor breakfast, so welcome mr. Cuccinelli. Thank you. Now, a bit of background, mr. Cuccinelli was born in edison, new jersey and grew up in virginia where he graduated from uva and then earned a law degree and a masters an International Commerce and policy. In 2002, mr. Cuccinelli won a special election to the state senate from Fairfax County and in 2009, he was elected attorney general for the commonwealth of virginia. Mr. Cuccinellis time as attorney earned him a reputation as a staunch conservative, which he parlayed into a bid for the governorship in 2013. He lost narrowly, but has remained engaged in politics, serving as head of the Senate Conservatives