Boeing CEO grilled in Congress after two new whistleblowers come forward – National & International News – TUE 18Jun2024

Boeing CEO grilled in Congress after two new whistleblowers come forward.

Biden plan to grant legal status to 500,000 undocumented spouses.

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Boeing CEO grilled in Congress after two new whistleblowers come forward

Since a door-plug blew out mid-flight on a Boeing 737 Max airplane in January, the company’s safety culture has been under the microscope. Numerous whistleblowers have since come forward alleging widespread safety violations at the company as well as a policy of discouraging quality controllers from coming forward (and threatening those who do). The Department of Justice has opened a criminal investigation into the door-plug incident. DOJ is also considering whether Boeing has violated the terms of a 2019 deferred prosecution agreement that followed two fatal 737 Max crashes (one in Ethiopia and the other in Indonesia) which killed a total of 349 people.

Boeing’s CEO David Calhoun testified today in front of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, his first appearance before Congress since the door-plug blowout. While the company has consistently denied allegations from whistleblowers, Calhoun acknowledged today that Boeing’s safety culture was “far from perfect”. However, he insisted the company was still in compliance with safety agreements with the government and was committed to improving its safety culture.

More whistleblowers

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), who chairs the subcommittee, announced during the hearing today that two new whistleblowers have come forward since a bombshell hearing in April. One of the whistleblowers is a current Boeing quality manager named Sam Mohawk and the other is anonymous. Mohawk has told the subcommittee that faulty parts have likely been installed on airplanes. He also said that his supervisors ordered him to conceal Boeing’s failure to track faulty parts from the Federal Aviation Administration.

The second anonymous whistleblower told the subcommittee that Boeing has sought to eliminate outside safety inspections and instead pushed employees to certify their own work and that of their colleagues. Both the claims of Mohawk and those of the anonymous whistleblower have been echoed by previous whistleblowers. 

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Related: Boeing and Airbus may have used “counterfeit” titanium on planes.

Biden touts plan to grant legal status to 500,000 undocumented spouses

President Biden has announced a plan that would shield about 500,000 undocumented people married to American citizens from deportation while they apply for permanent residency. The plan would also make it easier for “Dreamers” (beneficiaries of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program) who have obtained college degrees in particular fields to more easily receive visas to work in their fields. 

This announcement follows a recent controversial executive action that allows border officials to deport migrants without hearing asylum claims when daily arrivals exceed 2500. The American Civil Liberties Union and several migrant advocacy groups are challenging this order in court. A similar rule proposed by former President Trump was struck down by the courts.

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