Speech and mobility are among the foremost fuels of both democracy and industry. We are honored to share our research underscoring why government must protect these values.
Professor Orly Lobel
San Diego Law School
Workplace law professors Rachel Arnow-Richman, Jonathan Harris and Orly Lobel joined forces with information transparency experts Professors Mark Fenster and Margaret Kwoka to submit a public comment to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), criticizing its proposed nondisclosure agreement (NDA) for federal employees.
Drawing from their scholarship on worker mobility, whistleblowing and information controls, the authors argue that an NDA is unnecessary and inconsistent with recent policy reforms curtailing such restraints in the post-MeToo era. Federal employees are already subject to extensive statutory and regulatory obligations that protect sensitive information. Adding a broadly worded NDA, they contend, risks deterring lawful reporting and suppressing information of public concern. These chilling effects are especially concerning in the public sector where transparency and oversight are essential to ensuring government accountability.
Professors Arnow-Richman, Harris and Lobel are no strangers to the public discourse surrounding workers’ speech and mobility rights. The three submitted a public comment supporting the Federal Trade Commission’s 2024 ban on employee noncompetes. Professors Arnow-Richman and Lobel also previously collaborated on a Day One Project policy report calling for limits on employee NDAs in the private sector.
By bringing their research to administrative rulemakings and other policy initiatives, these academics ensure that contemporary workplace regulation is informed by research. As Professor Harris notes “Writing a comment like this puts the scholarship that we’ve generated in the academy into the public discourse. The public knows little about this attempt to bind all federal workers to silence. We shed light on the possible consequences for all of us.” Professor Lobel adds: “Speech and mobility are among the foremost fuels of both democracy and industry. We are honored to share our research underscoring why government must protect these values.”