Expanding Whistleblower Protections for Contractors Act of 2025
What does the HR 5578 do?
HR 5578 is a House bill sponsored by Rep. Robert Garcia (D-CA-42). 10 U.S.C. 4701 protects Department of Defense and NASA contractor employees from being fired, demoted, or discriminated against for disclosing evidence of wrongdoing in defense contracts; 41 U.S.C. 4712 does the same for non-defense federal contractors. This bill rewrites both statutes to swap "employee" for a new defined term "protected individual" — which explicitly covers state, tribal, territorial, and personal-services contractors and intelligence-community elements within DoD — expands the covered protected activities to include refusing to obey unlawful orders and disclosing gross mismanagement or gross waste, prohibits executive branch officials from requesting a reprisal, authorizes disciplinary action against officials who do, and bars waiver of the rights, forum, and remedies by any agreement including predispute arbitration.
Did HR 5578 pass? Where it stands
As of July 24, 2026, HR 5578 has passed the House.
Status: Passed House
Latest vote: House Passed by voice vote on July 20, 2026
Outlook: Moderate
Key provisions
- New "Protected Individual" Class
- Replaces "employee" throughout 10 U.S.C. 4701 and 41 U.S.C. 4712 with "protected individual"
- Covers contractors, subcontractors, grantees, and subgrantees of DoD, NASA, and (in §4712) the Federal Government
- Covers state, DC, tribal, Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa, Virgin Islands, N. Mariana Islands, and other territorial governments
- Covers political subdivisions, agencies, and instrumentalities of those governments
- Covers intelligence community elements within DoD (§4701) and generally (§4712) — defined by 50 U.S.C. 3003
- Covers employees, former employees, and personal-services contractors of the above
- Expanded Protected Activities
- Refusing to obey an order that would require violating a law, rule, or regulation
- Disclosing gross mismanagement of a DoD or NASA (or Federal) contract or grant
- Disclosing gross waste of Department funds or a substantial and specific danger to public health or safety
- Disclosing abuse of authority or violation of law related to any contract, subcontract, grant, or subgrant
- Executive Branch Reprisal-Request Ban
- Executive branch officials may not request that a contractor, subcontractor, grantee, or subgrantee engage in a prohibited reprisal
- Agencies may propose appropriate disciplinary action against any executive branch official who does
- Applies to both DoD/NASA (§4701) and non-defense (§4712) programs
- Non-Waivable Rights and Anti-Arbitration
- Rights, forum, and remedies may not be waived by any public or private agreement
- Includes any policy, form, or condition of employment
- Explicitly bars predispute arbitration agreements as a waiver mechanism
Last updated July 23, 2026