SACRAMENTO, Calif —The California Assembly unanimously approved a proposal Thursday to make it a crime for the state’s governor and top officials in the administration from signing or requesting anyone to sign nondisclosure agreements when creating new state laws and determining how to use taxpayer dollars.
The bill, AB 1652, now heads to the State Senate for consideration.
While the proposal has so far received an overwhelming amount of support, Democratic legislative leaders have yet to publicly speak about the proposal. Assembly leaders placed the bill on the “consent calendar,” meaning it’s approved in a long list of bills that also have unanimous support.
Nondisclosure agreements are contracts that legally force people to keep information a secret. Assemblyman Joe Patterson, R-Rocklin, filed the legislation this year in direct response to KCRA 3’s reporting on how California’s government has either used them or allowed groups to use them on the taxpayers’ dime.
“I am pleased that my colleagues unanimously and unambiguously supported my legislation to clarify that government officials – including the Governor’s office and members of the administration – should not create legally binding agreements to keep the public in the dark as it discusses legislation,” Patterson said in a statement to KCRA 3 on Thursday. “The legislative process is intended to be transparent and include members of the public, not exclude them. It’s great that my colleagues agree with this.”
In 2024, KCRA 3 reported that the governor’s office allowed nondisclosure agreements to keep secret the negotiations of a state law that raised the minimum wage for fast-food workers to $20 an hour. State lawmakers and other key voices later admitted they were entirely left out of the conversation.
Newsom’s allowed NDAs to cover the secret talks at the insistence of a major labor organization, SEIU California. Newsom’s office has said neither the governor nor his staff signed them. Since then, no one has been able to explain the bakery exemption, but multiple sources have told KCRA 3 it was for one of the governor’s billionaire donors, who is also a Panera franchisee.
Harsh Ghai, one of the largest operators of Burger King restaurants in the country, told KCRA 3 he was left in the dark about the law because of the use of NDAs. Joseph Bryant, an SEIU official who is also a member of California’s Fast-Food Council, which is meant to set the wages and working conditions for the workers across the state, would not confirm or deny that he signed the NDA.