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Ambiguous Instructions Give Disqualified Offeror A Second Chance

Client Alert | less than 1 min read | 06.12.07

The Court of Federal Claims in Heritage of Am., LLC v. U.S. (May 31, 2007) set aside a disqualification of an offeror when the solicitation instructions were unclear about the coverage and labor rates required in the multiple regions solicited, requiring a recompetition with unambiguous instructions. In the prior, related GAO protest, GAO had refused to consider this issue because it was "untimely," but Judge George Miller in this opinion joins the solid majority of the CFC judges holding that GAO timeliness requirements are inapplicable in court protests.

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Client Alert | 3 min read | 07.10.26

Federal Circuit Clarifies Application of Blue & Gold: Proposal Submission Deadline, Not Award, is the Operative Time for Filing

In Utech, Inc. v. United States, No. 24-1586 (Fed. Cir. June 24, 2026), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit clarified that in most cases, a pre-award protest must be filed before the proposal submission deadline to avoid the Blue & Gold waiver rule.  This decision, while nonprecedential, is in line with U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) precedent, which has long held that pre-award protests must be filed before the proposal submission deadline....