Congress Grants Immunity to Tipsters

By a wide margin of 371 to 40, the U.S. House of Representatives passed an anti-terrorism bill Friday that includes language granting immunity to tipsters who report suspicious activities to authorities.

Inspired by a lawsuit filed by six Muslim imams in Minneapolis earlier this year, the bill also cleared the Senate last week. President Bush said he will sign the bill into law.

Whistleblowers who report suspicious activities “in good faith” will be protected by “frivolous lawsuits,” the language of the bill says.

Lawmakers in the House and in the Senate wrestled over the language of the bill for weeks before they finally settled on the current version, which would retroactively protect tipsters as of October last year.

That would include the so-called “John Does” in the imams’ case based on their removal from a US Airways flight at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport last November, but determining whether the unnamed passengers in the lawsuit acted “in good faith” looms as the hardest part.