March 27, 2006

Congressman Mark Sounder

2231 Rayburn House Office Building

Washington, D.C. 20515

Congressman Souder,

Recently you said publicly, in reference to federal whistleblowers “I don’t see a bunch of these whistleblowers out there panning for food because they whistled” and that “they’re celebrities in the media. They sell books and all that. It’s a bogus argument for political purposes.”

As a whistleblower in the intelligence community, I followed regulations in reporting very suspicious activity that suggested espionage was being conducted against the United States. The classified information involved is the most highly protected intelligence and military operations and programs within our government. For attempting to safeguard our nation’s most sensitive secrets, I was retaliated against. This retaliation has cost me my job, and any hope of ever working in my profession again. It is now costing me my home as well. Many others have suffered similarly.

Consequently, it should come as no surprise to you that I find your comments extremely offensive. As a whistleblower that was attempting to protect the security of our citizens, I find it unconscionable that you would make such comments. It is national security federal whistleblowers that are at the frontline of ensuring incompetence and malfeasance does not cost our nation another significant terror attack. As we are now finding out, if concerned agents in the FBI, that were ignored by their incompetent supervisors, would have made their concerns public, 9/11 would not have occurred.

As a fellow republican, I am dismayed that you have trivialized the issue by attributing it to party politics. Protecting our nation should be a bipartisan effort. I certainly have no political agenda now in relation to being a whistleblower and, at the time I was attempting to bring light to a possible case of espionage, I only felt I was doing my job. It would appear that partisan politics are being played by some, as it would seem that many in Congress prefer to shirk their responsibility of oversight in favor of protecting an executive branch from embarrassment and accountability.

I will do my best to inform your constituents of your position and how it affects their security.

Sincerely,

Russell D. Tice

Former Intelligence Analyst & Capabilities Officer, NSA

Current NSWBC Member