Today, as we've noted CREW hosted a teleconference with Jon Soltz, Co-Founder and Chair of VoteVets.org and two Whistleblowers, Jeff Kenner and Tamra Elshaug, who worked for Sioux Manufacturing, to discuss the need for a congressional investigation into a $74 million Department of Defense contract awarded to a North Dakota manufacturing company, Sioux Manufacturing Company, which has been outfitting our nation's troops with substandard Kevlar helmets.

Via Raw Story [1], Melanie Sloan asked some key questions today:

“How was Sioux Manufacturing allowed to make insufficient Kevlar in the first place and then once that was exposed how could the company be awarded a new contract? Are there soldiers who would have escaped injury or death if their helmets had met government standards rather than the inferior ones produced by Sioux?" CREW executive director Melanie Sloan asked. "Frankly, the chairs and ranking members of Armed Services, Senators Carl Levin and John McCain and Representatives Ike Skleton and Duncan Hunter cannot be permitted to take a pass on this.”

Tape recordings of employees discussing the production of the substandard Kevlar for helmets were publicly played and posted for the first time during the TELE-PRESS Conference today. Those recordings and transcripts can be found here [1].