Report claims FAA dismisses majority of whistleblower complaints
This article features Government Accountability Project Legal Director, Tom Devine, and was originally published here.
A report in the Seattle Times has found that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) dismisses the majority of whistleblower complaints it receives.
The findings emerged in the wake of several high-profile Boeing failures, where whistleblowers exposed the company’s resistance to addressing worker concerns and highlighted the FAA’s insufficient regulatory oversight.
The Seattle Times examined FAA reports submitted to Congress between 2020 and 2023, revealing that the agency’s whistleblower system is “overwhelmed” and “delivering underwhelming results for whistleblowers.”
Majority of complaints dismissed
Out of 728 safety complaints filed, only 62 cases (8.5%) led to findings of violations. Additionally, nearly 40 % of complaints were dismissed before reaching the fact-finding phase and approximately 90 % of safety complaints concluded without any FAA-identified violations, despite whistleblowers risking their personal and professional reputations to report their concerns.
The article states that the FAA often dismisses whistleblower complaints during preliminary reviews for reasons such as insufficient information to investigate, duplicated allegations already under investigation, or lack of evidence for retaliation claims. “It’s impossible to know how many of the hundreds of complaints the...
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