Axios: Congress passes groundbreaking bill limiting use of secret agreements in sexual harassment cases

The U.S. House took a groundbreaking, bipartisan step Wednesday to limit the use of non-disclosure and non-disparagement agreements to silence survivors of workplace sexual misconduct.

THE LATEST:

The Speak Out Act now heads to President Biden's desk after passing the House 315 -109; it had passed the Senate unanimously in September.

• "Sometimes we'll get like one or two Republicans and call something bipartisan," Rep. Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.), a cosponsor, said at a press conference Wednesday afternoon. "This is not one of those examples."

• This is the second #MeToo bill passed this year, and together these these bills represent "the most significant labor legislation this century," Bustos said.

WHY IT MATTERS:

The bill comes slightly more than five years after the resurgence of #MeToo captured the nation's attention, and demonstrates that social movement's long reach.

• The vote Wednesday is a win for former Fox News hosts Gretchen Carlson and Julie Roginsky, whose nonprofit Lift Our voices was founded in 2019 specifically to end these kinds of secret agreements, and who pushed for the bill.

• "The only way to end the vicious cycle of abuse is to end the vicious cycle of silence," Carlson said Wednesday.