The question before the Court in Lawson v. FMR LLC was whether the whistleblower protection of Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 applies only to employees of public corporations or also to the employees of contractors with those corporations. Contractors' employees are included, ruled the Supreme Court today, in a 6-3 decision that did not split along traditional ideological lines (Justice Ginsburg wrote the opinion of the Court, joined by Chief Justice Roberts, Justices Breyer and Kagan, and "in principal part" by Justices Scalia and Thomas). The majority concluded that its interpretation was required not only by the statutory text but also to avoid leaving a gaping hole in the statute's coverage, because many mutual funds covered by Sarbanes-Oxley (including the Fidelity funds at issue in this case) have no employees themselves and operate solely through contractors.
