I've learned about US's Office of Special Counsel - an agency that's tasked to protect government whistleblowers - from an episode of Person of Interest. In it, a low-ranking NSA worker tried to ask his employees about what he discovered, only to get terminated and framed for drug use; he called the OSC and in response to that the OSC sent his coordinates to a squad of black-ops hitmen.

While obviously work of fiction, it somehow feels like an accurate description of how this works, and this article only confirms it. If you stumble upon a secret that could endanger important people in the government, the government ain't gonna be helping you. I think Drake and Crane are lucky to be alive today.