The two bills aim to combat NDA abuse and create protections for “employees whose professional images are used for illegitimate purposes”
Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney, the chairwoman of the U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Oversight and Reform, is introducing two bills “to rein in the abuse of non-disclosure, confidentiality, and non-disparagement agreements in the workplace and create new protections for employees whose professional images are used for illegitimate purposes.”
According to a press release about the legislation, this is as a result of the committee’s investigation into the . The months-long probe that began in October 2021 is looking into the franchise’s workplace culture, how the league handled misconduct reports, what the NFL’s standards should be and “legislative reforms needed to address these issues across the NFL and other workplaces,” according to the committee’s press release from earlier this month.
The two bills are called the Accountability for Workplace Misconduct Act and Professional Images Protection Act. The former concerns the abuse of NDAs, specifically “prohibiting employers from using these agreements to limit, prevent, or interfere with an employee’s ability to disclose harassment, discrimination, or retaliation to government agencies or Congress.” Additionally, it would set uniform requirements for how organizations operate workplace investigations.
Meanwhile, the latter would ensure that employees have a say in the use of their images, requiring consent before professional images are taken or distributed and prohibiting the use of professional images for “illegitimate purposes.”