diff --git a/third_party/copybara/copy.bara.sky b/third_party/copybara/copy.bara.sky
index ea9234c72c..2d543e2496 100644
--- a/third_party/copybara/copy.bara.sky
+++ b/third_party/copybara/copy.bara.sky
@@ -21,6 +21,7 @@ core.workflow(
         patch.apply(patches = [
             "patches/0001-Make-Mercurial-at-least-slightly-usable.patch",
             "patches/0002-HgRepository-HGPLAIN.patch",
+            "patches/0003-HgDestination-nonpublishing.patch",
         ]),
         core.move("", "third_party/copybara"),
     ],
diff --git a/third_party/copybara/java/com/google/copybara/hg/HgDestination.java b/third_party/copybara/java/com/google/copybara/hg/HgDestination.java
index b60e49111b..41ca1c83b3 100644
--- a/third_party/copybara/java/com/google/copybara/hg/HgDestination.java
+++ b/third_party/copybara/java/com/google/copybara/hg/HgDestination.java
@@ -281,7 +281,7 @@ public class HgDestination implements Destination<HgRevision> {
 
       // Set the default path of the local repo to be the remote repo, so we can push to it
       Files.write(localRepo.getHgDir().getParent().resolve(".hg/hgrc"),
-          String.format("[paths]\ndefault = %s\n", repoUrl).getBytes(StandardCharsets.UTF_8));
+          String.format("[paths]\ndefault = %s\n\n[phases]\npublish = False\n", repoUrl).getBytes(StandardCharsets.UTF_8));
 
       console.progress("Hg Destination: Computing diff");
       getDiffAndStageChanges(destinationFiles, workdir, localRepo);
diff --git a/third_party/copybara/patches/0003-HgDestination-nonpublishing.patch b/third_party/copybara/patches/0003-HgDestination-nonpublishing.patch
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..504d0b28ff
--- /dev/null
+++ b/third_party/copybara/patches/0003-HgDestination-nonpublishing.patch
@@ -0,0 +1,20 @@
+# HG changeset patch
+# User Luke Granger-Brown <hg@lukegb.com>
+# Date 1589670529 -3600
+#      Sun May 17 00:08:49 2020 +0100
+# Node ID 9b758f16a985c3e801e07ea1a6e04f01924ae774
+# Parent  ac30ad2187112d227da97d68c1996663fabfa1f6
+third_party/copybara: patch HgDestination to make new repos non-publishing
+
+diff --git a/java/com/google/copybara/hg/HgDestination.java b/java/com/google/copybara/hg/HgDestination.java
+--- a/java/com/google/copybara/hg/HgDestination.java
++++ b/java/com/google/copybara/hg/HgDestination.java
+@@ -281,7 +281,7 @@ public class HgDestination implements De
+ 
+       // Set the default path of the local repo to be the remote repo, so we can push to it
+       Files.write(localRepo.getHgDir().getParent().resolve(".hg/hgrc"),
+-          String.format("[paths]\ndefault = %s\n", repoUrl).getBytes(StandardCharsets.UTF_8));
++          String.format("[paths]\ndefault = %s\n\n[phases]\npublish = False\n", repoUrl).getBytes(StandardCharsets.UTF_8));
+ 
+       console.progress("Hg Destination: Computing diff");
+       getDiffAndStageChanges(destinationFiles, workdir, localRepo);