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Under Siege: Trade Associations Rap White House for Recent Flood of EOs Targeting Contractors

Client Alert | 1 min read | 08.14.15

In an August 3 letter to the White House, four trade associations (the AIA, PSC, NDIA, and ITIC) requested "on behalf of the thousands of companies … that no further presidential directives primarily focused on government contractors be issued for the foreseeable future." The letter cited a dozen recent executive orders related to procurement that have resulted in a significant increase in the cost of doing business with the government, including the recent one on "Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces" (discussed here), and urged the Administration to address the "impacts, inefficiencies, and in many cases, unintended consequences" created by the recent deluge of EOs directed at government contractors.


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Client Alert | 3 min read | 04.14.26

DOJ’s False Claims Act Resolution Against IBM Signals Heightened Risk for Federal Contractors with DEI Programs

On Friday, April 10, 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) has agreed to pay just over $17 million to resolve allegations that it violated the False Claims Act (FCA) by failing to comply with federal anti-discrimination requirements incorporated into its federal contracts due to allegedly discriminatory diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) employment practices. This resolution marks the first FCA settlement secured by the DOJ under its Civil Rights Fraud Initiative, created in May 2025, and announced by then-Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche as part of the administration’s coordinated efforts to target allegedly unlawful DEI practices. Per the agreement, the settlement is neither an admission of liability by IBM nor a concession by the United States that its claims are not well founded....