The Whistleblowers I was referring to are Brown (exposing Stratfor and HB Gary) himself and John Kiriakou (CIA-waterboarding), both of whom have already served time for their alleged crimes.

Technically, Brown is not a whistleblower but he did alert the public to black ops that no one knew were being conducted.

If there were charges of sedition for any member i don't see how that would effect the research, maybe they would lose a researcher but the organization itself would be decentralized i imagine so it would just carry on regardless.