Part of: Mace Federal Removal (Berg v. Bryant → D.S.C.) · House Ethics Committee Investigation of Rep. Nancy Mace (OCC Review 25-5681) · Berg v. Bryant (and Bryant's Third-Party Complaint against Mace) · Mace v. Bowman · Assignment Desk Works, LLC v. Alexis Berg · Musgrave v. Mace (2:25-cv-01823-RMG) · Mace v. Bryant · Litigation Overview & Court-Filing Index
Gretchen Carlson, who helped write the Speak Out Act, files a sworn declaration backing Alexis Berg
On June 8, 2026, Alexis Berg's counsel filed a reply brief in Assignment Desk Works, LLC v. Alexis Berg (No. 2025-CP-10-2671) arguing that the federal Speak Out Act makes the non-disparagement clause ADW is suing on judicially unenforceable, because the dispute before the court involves sexual-assault allegations. Attached was a sworn declaration from Gretchen Carlson, the former Fox News anchor whose 2016 case helped inspire the Act, who states she has met with Berg and that 'this is exactly the situation we fought to address,' and offers to testify. ADW argues the Act does not apply. The motion is undecided; the underlying allegations are contested and denied.
On June 8, 2026, attorney Marybeth Mullaney, counsel for Alexis Berg, filed a Reply in Support of Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings in Assignment Desk Works, LLC v. Alexis Berg, Case No. 2025-CP-10-2671, one of the cluster of related Charleston County cases tied to Rep. Nancy Mace and her former fiancé, Patrick Bryant. The brief argues that a single federal statute, the Speak Out Act, resolves the case in Berg's favor. Attached to it is a sworn declaration from the person most associated with that law: Gretchen Carlson. The filing is reproduced and linked below.
Page 1 of Berg's Reply in Support of Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings, electronically filed June 8, 2026, Charleston County Court of Common Pleas.
What the case is about
Assignment Desk Works, LLC, a company tied to Patrick Bryant, sued Berg, a former employee, to enforce a non-disparagement clause from a settlement that ended an earlier 2019 wage-and-hour dispute. Berg moved for judgment on the pleadings, arguing the clause cannot be enforced because of the Speak Out Act (Pub. L. 117-224, 42 U.S.C. § 19401 et seq.), the 2022 law that makes a predispute nondisclosure or non-disparagement clause judicially unenforceable "with respect to a sexual assault dispute or sexual harassment dispute."
Berg's reply makes three arguments:
- The trigger is the present dispute, not the old contract. The Act, she argues, does not require that the original settlement concern sexual misconduct, only that the dispute now before the court does. She notes that ADW's own amended complaint pleads that Berg "told [a third party] she was sexually assaulted in the presence of Patrick Bryant," which, she contends, puts the current action squarely "with respect to a sexual assault dispute."
- The Act voids the whole clause, not statement-by-statement. ADW had argued that even if the Act applies, individual epithets Berg allegedly used ("snake," "sociopath") are unrelated to any assault and remain actionable. Berg responds that the Act renders the clause itself unenforceable once its conditions are met, and that the messages ADW catalogs were private texts to family and friends in the aftermath of what she says she experienced.
- Only an allegation is required. ADW argued the Act should not apply because no court has found that an assault occurred. Berg counters that the statute applies "in instances in which conduct is alleged to have violated" law, requiring no conviction or finding.
ADW disputes all of this, and its summary-judgment papers catalog dozens of statements it says breached the clause. The motion has not been decided.
The Carlson declaration
The reply's most notable attachment is a declaration signed under penalty of perjury by Gretchen Carlson, the former Fox News anchor who, with Julie Roginsky, co-founded the nonprofit Lift Our Voices and advocated for the Speak Out Act after her own 2016 sexual-harassment settlement left her bound by a nondisclosure agreement. Carlson states that she submitted the declaration "to assist the Court in understanding what this law was intended to do," and that the Act was meant to reach beyond the original signer's own claim:
"When you sign an NDA, you cannot talk to a coworker, you cannot talk to your family, and in some cases you cannot even talk to your minister or your therapist. That is how you continue the cycle of bad behavior, you cover it up, you pay people off, and you tell them they can never have their voice ever again. That is why I fought for this law."
On her connection to this case specifically, Carlson states:
"I have met with Ms. Berg and her counsel, and it is because of cases like hers that I advocated for this Act. This is exactly the situation we fought to address."
She adds that she is "willing to testify and make [herself] available to this Court." The declaration was electronically signed June 7, 2026.
Why it matters
Having the law's most prominent author submit a declaration interpreting it, in a live case, is unusual, and it directly answers an argument ADW had made: that the Speak Out Act, born of Carlson's own employment case, was meant only for employees suing over their own harassment. Carlson's filing says otherwise. Whether the court agrees is a question for the pending motion; this dispatch records the filing, not its outcome.
This dispatch summarizes one side's brief and a supporting declaration. The allegations underlying this cluster of cases, including Berg's account of an assault, ADW's breach-of-contract claims, Bryant's claims, and Mace's separate positions, are contested, unproven, and have not been adjudicated. Patrick Bryant and the other men named in related matters deny the allegations against them; Mace denies the claims against her. Nothing here is a finding of fact. For the discovery fight over the files in this same case, see the third-party-neutral order. For background, see People in the Public Record.
Sources & related coverage:
- The filing itself: Berg's Reply in Support of Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings, with the Declaration of Gretchen Carlson (PDF, 11 pages), Assignment Desk Works, LLC v. Alexis Berg, Charleston County Court of Common Pleas, Ninth Judicial Circuit, Case No. 2025-CP-10-2671, electronically filed June 8, 2026.
- The state docket is verifiable on the SC Judicial Branch Public Index (Charleston County) under Case No. 2025-CP-10-2671.
- Related: Court appoints former Judge Kristi Harrington as third-party neutral over the disputed files · Mace calls ADW's suit a "fishing expedition" and moves to dismiss it · Berg v. Bryant · The Litigation.