Protesters picketing businesses could face restraining orders under NC bill (2025)

North Carolina lawmakers moved ahead Tuesday with legislation that would make it easier for employers to obtain restraining orders against protesters picketing their businesses.

Sponsored by three Republicans, Senate Bill 484 adds “mass picketing” to the state’s workplace violence prevention law, which was enacted in 2004 to safeguard workers from domestic violence, stalkers, and coworker threats. While the current law allows employers to seek civil no-contact orders from district courts on behalf of their employees, the new bill would let both employees and employers obtain protective orders should picketers act in a way that interferes with business entry and exit points, obstructs public roads, or hinders “the pursuit of any lawful work.”

The bill arrives as people across the country have rallied outside businesses like Tesla, Target, and Avelo Airlines to voice displeasure with corporate political stances. Since February, a group called Engaged Durhamites for Democracy has held near-weekly protests outside the Tesla dealership on Glenwood Avenue in Raleigh, part of coordinated protests against the car company owned by billionaire and Trump administration official Elon Musk.

“We are only trying to drive down the stock of Tesla so that Musk leaves the government,” said organizer Kathryn Pollack. “That is our sole purpose.”

Pollack said her group hasn’t obstructed access to the dealership. “We are not getting in the way of anybody,” she said. “And cars can come and go into Tesla if they want.”

Committee advances bill

Sens. Tim Moffitt of Hendersonville, Warren Daniel of Morganton, and Danny Britt of Lumberton are the primary sponsors of the legislation, and the latter two help chair their chamber’s judiciary committee, where the bill had a hearing Tuesday.

“What 484 strives to achieve is a balance between those who want to peacefully protest and those who actually want to go to work and earn a living uninhibited by those that are protesting,” Moffitt said during the hearing.

A number of committee Democrats voiced worries about the legislation.

“I believe that there are some aspects of this bill that could continue to intimidate people from engaging in peaceful protest,” said Sen. Lisa Grafstein of Wake County. “So, I just want to raise that as a concern.”

Sen. Mujtaba Mohammed, a Democrat from Mecklenburg County, introduced two amendments to the bill — both of which the committee approved. The first defined obstruction as “a sustained or deliberate physical blockage that substantially materially prevents ingress or egress and causes demonstrable destruction to operations or public safety.” His second amendment affirmed that nothing in the bill should infringe on people’s constitutional rights to picket.

“It is simply making clear again that you don’t want to have any type of chilling effect,” he said.

SB 484 is similar in language to a West Virginia state bill introduced last month, noted Elly Page, a senior legal adviser at the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law, which tracks domestic protest laws.

“I don’t have any special insights into the motivation behind (the North Carolina) bill,” she said. “But it would certainly seem to have clear implications for Tesla protesters or others who protest near a ‘place of employment,’ including a state or local government building.”

No-contact orders can vary in scope, with North Carolina district courts empowered to prevent respondents from visiting employees or harassing employers at the workplace. Each order must clearly inform recipients that “a knowing violation of a civil no‑contact order shall be punishable as contempt of court which may result in a fine or imprisonment.”

This story was originally published April 29, 2025 at 7:30 AM.