Trump Admin Proposes Federal Employee NDAs to Stop Leaks
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- The Trump administration proposed non-disclosure agreements for all current and future federal employees, with the notice announced Tuesday on the Office of Personnel Management website and expected to be officially published in the Federal Register on Wednesday.
- OPM cited "several recent instances" of unauthorized leaks as justification, including FBI and Department of Homeland Security employees disclosing information about planned immigration enforcement actions and unauthorized disclosures to The New York Times and The Washington Post about the U.S. raid on Venezuela this past January.
- The New York Times directly disputed OPM's account, with executive director Charles Stadtlander stating the paper "did not have verified details about the pending operation to capture Maduro or a story prepared, nor did we withhold publication at the request of the Trump administration."
- The FBI seized the electronic devices of a Washington Post reporter in January as part of the leak crackdown, a move that alarmed media organizations and press freedom advocates.
- Employment attorney Michael L. Vogelsang Jr. challenged the legal basis for the proposal, noting that Congress already passed a law prohibiting employers from implementing or enforcing NDAs, and asking "how can OPM make a regulation that violates the law?"
- AFGE National President Everett Kelley called the proposed NDA "another attempt by the administration to purge the civil service of nonpartisan career employees and replace them with loyalists who won't speak out against waste, fraud, and abuse."
Why it matters: The proposal hits a legal wall before it even gets off the ground: attorney Michael L. Vogelsang Jr. pointed out that Congress already passed a law prohibiting employers from implementing NDAs, asking how OPM can issue a regulation that violates existing statute. The Times is also publicly contradicting OPM's account of the Venezuela reporting, meaning the administration is fighting the press and the law at the same time.
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