A bill banning federal employees from viewing or downloading porn on government devices advanced out of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Wednesday.
“There is absolutely no excuse for federal employees to be viewing or downloading pornographic materials on the taxpayers’ dime,” Republican Rep. Mark Meadows, who sponsored the bill, said in a statement announcing the progress.
“To ignore this issue would not only condone an abuse of taxpayers’ dollars, but also embrace an unhealthy workplace,” he added. “Today’s action should send a clear message that it is time for zero tolerance of this kind of behavior.”
Meadows cited a number of reports of federal employees watching a lot of porn at work as evidence the current policies in place discouraging that behavior be put into law. An Environmental Protection Agency employee has not been fired, although an Inspector General report last year revealed he was watching porn for two to six hours per day on his government-issued office computer since 2010.
Also last year, a Treasury Department employee blamed a lack of work for the discovery that he had viewed 13,000 images of porn in six weeks, reported The Washington Times. Another bored General Services Administration employee reportedly spent two hours a day watching porn.
“While there are rules in place at most agencies to ban this kind of unprofessional and unacceptable workplace behavior, it continues to take place,” he said.
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