Coveted Shaw-Marvin and Martha Mitchell Pillar Award Winners Presented and Extended Film Festival Run Announced at National Press Club Event
WASHINGTON The ten-day Whistleblower Summit & Film Festival closed yesterday. Hosted by ACORN 8, in association with the Justice Integrity Project (JIP), the 11th Annual Whistleblowers Summit & Film Festival (a hybrid event) returned to Capitol Hill and the National Press Club to a rousing success.
The formal dates the Whistleblower Summit ran were July 22 through July 31, 2023. The theme for this year's summit was Seeking the Truth 60 Years After the JFK Assassination, but the capstone event was the National Whistleblower Appreciation Day tribute to Daniel Ellsberg hosted by ACORN 8 at the National Press Club.
Patricia Ellsberg (wife) participated from California (via video). She had to join in because "Daniel felt most at home with whistleblowers and protestors--they were his tribe." Mary Ellsberg (daughter) also attended the event.
Highlights include a posthumous keynote speech from Daniel Ellsberg from his Lifetime Achievement Pillar Award (2021) when Mike Gravel (D-AK) received a posthumous Pillar Award for placing the Pentagon Papers into the Congressional Record.
A friends and family panel honored the legacy of Daniel Ellsberg, including Medea Benjamin, the co-founder of the women-led peace group CODEPINK and the co-founder of the human rights group Global Exchange, and John Kirisoku (Author), a CIA Officer Turned Whistleblower. The evening concluded with a special summit film screening of The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers.
Marcel Reid (ACORN 8) announced/presented the Shaw-Marven Pillar Award. This award is given to those who are currently serving or veterans who have reported waste, fraud, or abuse. Named in honor and recognition of America's first whistleblower sailors in 1778, we are awarding it posthumously to Philadelphia 15.
The 'Philadelphia 15' was fifteen black Sailors assigned to USS Philadelphia who, in October 1940, authored a letter published in the Pittsburgh Courier describing the racial discrimination, abuse, and inability to advance into other, higher-ranking positions. They urged black mothers not to let their sons join the Navy and were subsequently discharged because of the letter with "bad conduct discharges" or "undesirable" charges. They were each removed from the United States Navy and denied benefits they were eligible to receive. These actions were recognized as fraud and abuse, two of the requirements to be considered a whistleblower.
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