BILL NUMBER: S4549

SPONSOR: GOUNARDES
 
TITLE OF BILL:

An act to amend the civil rights law, in relation to libel and defama-
tion actions

 
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:

To protect victims of employment discrimination from libel or defamation
suits when they file internal complaints about the discrimination they
are experiencing

 
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:

Section one of this bill amends Section 74 of the Civil Rights Law which
provides the circumstances in which defamation suits may not be pursued.
This bill amends this section to say that victims of employment discrim-
ination are protected from defamation suits when such suits are based on
"protected allegations" of unlawful discrimination made to the employer
or his or her agent by the victims of unlawful discrimination or his or
              

her agent.

Section two provides an immediate effective date.

 
JUSTIFICATION:

This bill aims to protect victims of workplace discrimination based on a
protected class (age, race, creed, color, national origin, sexual orien-
tation, gender identity or expression, military status, sex, disability,
predisposing genetic characteristics, familial status, marital status,
or status as a victim of domestic violence) covered under the NYS or NYC
human rights law or federal anti-discrimination law. Victims of work-
place discrimination such as sexual harassment will frequently find
themselves the subjects of defamation suits for libel or slander as a
result of filing internal complaints. These retaliatory tactics then
have the desired effect of getting the victim to abandon their complaint
or significantly delaying the investigation and adjudication of the
underlying harassment as well as deterring future victims at the work-
site from coming forward.

This bill aims to eliminate these nefarious court actions by creating an
absolute privilege for internal workplace complaints of discrimination,
meaning that complainants cannot be sued for making protected allega-
tions of discrimination. The bill is careful to include agents of
employees and employers, as employees will frequently go through third
parties to pursue defamation suits such as by having a relevant supervi-
sor, rather than the employer itself, sue the employee for defamation.
In other instances, employers will pursue an action against an aggrieved
employee's lawyer in addition to the employee themselves (while the
Human Rights Law bars retaliation for complaints of discrimination from
employees and contractors, case law is not clear on the point of whether
or not employees' lawyers are also protected). This bill prohibits defa-
mation suits in cases of protected allegations for all employees and
their agents, taking care to define protected allegations as a complaint
of an unlawful discriminatory practice in the workplace or employment
discrimination, including retaliation, prohibited by federal, state, or
city law. It is the sponsor's hope that this reform will encourage
victims of workplace discrimination to speak out without fear of a
potential defamation suit.

 
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:

2022: S6034 - Referred to Codes

2021:  S6034 - Referred to Codes

 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:

TBD

 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
Immediate