A BILL to amend and reenact § 40.1-27.3 of the Code of Virginia, relating to protection of employees; retaliatory action against employee prohibited.
HB722 amends Virginia’s whistleblower/anti-retaliation law for employees, § 40.1-27.3, to clarify and reinforce protections against employer retaliation. The bill prohibits an employer from discharging, disciplining, threatening, discriminating against, penalizing, or otherwise retaliating against an employee because the employee reports a suspected violation of federal or state law, participates in a government or law-enforcement investigation, refuses to commit a criminal act, refuses an unlawful work order after notifying the employer, or provides information or testimony in an investigation or hearing.
The bill also defines “federal or state law or regulation” to include federal law, Virginia law, and final rules published in the Federal Register or Virginia Administrative Code. It preserves existing limits on the statute by excluding disclosures of protected data or privileged information, false statements made knowingly or with reckless disregard, and disclosures that would themselves violate law or impair confidentiality protections. It retains the employee’s right to bring a civil action within one year and seek injunctions, reinstatement, lost wages and benefits, interest, and attorney fees and costs, while also preserving an exception for conduct covered by Virginia’s occupational safety and health retaliation remedy provisions.
HB722 would strengthen and clarify the scope of Virginia’s employee anti-retaliation protections under § 40.1-27.3 by expressly covering retaliation tied to reports of legal violations, cooperation with investigations, refusal to engage in illegal conduct, and testimony before government bodies. It would affect employers across the Commonwealth by expanding the statutory basis for whistleblower-style claims and preserving civil remedies for affected employees, while leaving intact existing confidentiality, privilege, and false-statement limitations and the separate remedy framework for certain workplace safety retaliation claims.
The available legislative history suggests generally favorable treatment of the bill, as reflected by its incorporation into HB930 (Simon) by voice vote. No committee transcript or recorded floor debate is provided, so there is no detailed record of objections or support statements in the materials supplied. The procedural outcome indicates the proposal was acceptable enough to be folded into another measure rather than advancing as a standalone contested bill.
The main points of potential contention are the breadth of the anti-retaliation protections and how they interact with employer interests in discipline, confidentiality, and workplace management. Employers may be concerned that the bill broadens whistleblower claims by covering more forms of reporting and refusal to follow unlawful orders, while the bill’s express carve-outs for privileged, confidential, or knowingly false disclosures are designed to limit abuse. Another possible issue is the overlap with existing occupational safety and health retaliation remedies, which the bill explicitly excludes from this section to avoid duplicative claims.