If lying about you employment history is a protected activity, then if a pre-employment background check catches you lying about your employment history, and you say "no I am salting," that also is protection from having your offer rescinded?
In court it would be tested whether your deceit is actually relevant to the salting. Faking an entire resume to get into a place where you can't do the work isn't likely to fly, hiding your time working for a union by claiming you did first line customer support might.
