Contract law is a branch of the civil law and breach of contract gives rise to civil liability.

Let’s talk about legal bribes vs illegal bribes.

A “legal bribe” would be something like offering some crazy incentive to a councillor that is tied to the project being approved, like saying “We’re thinking about donating $100,000 to your re-election campaign” or “Your son should apply for our data analyst position with an annual salary of $100,000”. There is no explicit agreement, just a wink and a nod. But the person being bribed knows that the receipt of the reward is contingent on their acting according to the bribe offerer’s wishes. This form of bribery is legal in the United States and actually constitutionally protected according to the infamously fucked-up Supreme Court case Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. If the councillor doesn’t do what the data centre company does, they’ll simply not receive the donation or their son won’t get the job.

An “illegal bribe” is just a classic bribe: an agreement that we will pay you X dollars cash if you do Y. That’s illegal in the US and carries strict penalties. But since it’s illegal, if the money has already been paid and the bribe recipient doesn’t do what was agreed, or the bribe offerer doesn’t pay after the bribe recipient does what they’re told, there is absolutely no recourse to the legal system because courts will not enforce contracts for illegal activities.

The NDA is probably a legal bribe. The company invites the councillor to discuss the data centre project at the fanciest restaurant in town, makes them sign an NDA that “all details of the meeting will remain confidential”, then discusses the possibility of the campaign donation or nepo job offer at the meeting. Then the company pays for the meal on the company card. All of that is technically legal, but of course, it’s horribly corrupt so if the locals caught wind of it, they’d run the councillor out of town. Entire municipal councils have been recalled from office before as a result of unpopular data centre projects.