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The claim that there is a "firsthand knowledge" requirement for an intel community whistleblower to file an "urgent concern" complaint is an emerging and desperate right-wing media defense of Trump. There is no such requirement. 
The "firsthand knowledge" requirement claim seems to have originated from an extremely dishonest article published at the Federalist: thefederalist.com/2019/09/27/int…
The Federalist claims that forms available to IG employees concerning the filing of whistleblower complaints were recently changed to eliminate a requirement that whistleblowers have "firsthand knowledge" of wrongdoing.
The article was published following endless claims from Trump defenders that the whistleblower complaint is based solely on "hearsay" or "secondhand" information. But that is not the case, as the complaint actually references firsthand knowledge:
The Federalist article dishonestly grapples with this fact by claiming "the complainant acknowledged he was 'not a direct witness' to the wrongdoing he claims Trump committed." As you can see above, that is a misrepresentation of the complaint.
One thing that stands out is that if a "firsthand knowledge" requirement existed, the OLC opinion concluding the complaint didn't fulfill the requirements of an "urgent complaint" would have only been a paragraph long. But it wasn't: lawfareblog.com/olc-issues-opi…
In any case, the forms cited by the Federalist are not the ultimate authority, that would be the actual law §3033(k)(5)(G) which does not contain any requirement about firsthand knowledge.
Additional demonstration of how the whistleblower forms cited in the Federalist article were presented in a very dishonest fashion:
To get a sense of the mendacious stupidity of the Federalist article, look at what its author @seanmdav was tweeting. His article relies on the premise that DNI forms have been surreptitiously changed, yet he promotes the notion the original form never even existed:
@seanmdav Here is another thread explaining why the claim being pushed by the Federalist is false. The false claim has now been promoted by Rep. Mark Meadows and Don Trump Jr.
@seanmdav The Federalist article has now been promoted by Trump himself. One additional point others have made that I think is really good is that the whole issue is a red herring and is also moot -- the central allegation is corroborated by the "transcript"
@seanmdav Now in article format: mediamatters.org/federalist/fal…
