US District Court of Maryland Rules That STOCK Act Violates Federal Employee’s Right to Privacy

In a major public disclosure decision this week, federal district court judge Alexander Williams ruled the STOCK Act goes too far in its mandated disclosure of the personal finances of approximately 28,000 high-level federal government employees.

Arent Fox Political Law partner Craig Engle comments, “Courts are developing a realistic view about what actually constitutes corruption or the appearance of corruption. And here, a person’s real privacy rights outweigh any perception that some kind of corruption exists.”

“Simply put: this statute does more harm than good.”

The STOCK Act had mandated the disclosure of individual employee’s interests in property, sources of earned and unearned income and stock trades. This over-broad disclosure releases more information than is justified, especially the Internet Age, ruled the court.