S6: Episode 42 - Tom Mueller

For this week, Tom Mueller joins the show to discuss his book, "Crisis of Conscience: Whistleblowing In An Age Of Fraud." It was released in October. Tom describes how he came to work on this book, which over 500-plus pages documents and explores whistleblowing in many different arenas—corporate, institutional, government, etc. He highlights common threads he sees in various whistleblower cases, such as what leads one to become a whistleblower. We talk about the Hanford nuclear waste site in Washington state and the incredible dangers the site poses to humanity. According to Tom, more whistleblowers than any other site on Earth come from Hanford. Yet, very few citizens know about Hanford. Later in the interview, Tom outlines how corporate executives responsible for waste, fraud, abuse, and illegality use universities and philanthropy to launder their reputations. He shares a whistleblower case related to this practice. We conclude with some conversation on national security whistleblowing, what is at stake with President Donald Trump's administration, and how President Barack Obama's administration gave Trump many of the tools he has available for continuing a war on whistleblowers. That includes prosecuting truth-tellers with the Espionage Act.