Insights

On March 20, 2025, the White House issued Executive Order (“EO”), “Eliminating Waste and Saving Taxpayer Dollars by Consolidating Procurement,” to consolidate domestic civilian contracting for “common goods and services” within one agency—the General Services Administration (“GSA”). The EO defines “common goods and services” as those described in the Category Management system first developed as part of a previous effort, dating back to 2014, to coordinate spending across the government.

On September 8, 2022, the Department of Defense (“DoD”) issued Class Deviation 2022-O0009 (the “Deviation”) immediately authorizing contracting officers to allow active registration in the System for Award Management (“SAM”) within 30 days of contract award or three days prior to submission of the first invoice (whichever comes first) rather than at the time of award—provided the contractor can prove it has initiated or attempted to start the SAM registration process.  The Deviation is in effect through October 31, 2022 unless rescinded or extended.

The General Services Administration (GSA) transition from the Dun & Bradstreet (D&B) Data Universal Number System (DUNS) to the Unique Entity Identifier (UEI), which took effect on April 4, 2022, has faced challenges.  Substantial verification and validation delays continue, agencies have had to issue guidance for the management of SAM delays, and even Congress is showing concerns.   

Congress has not passed crucial funding bills for the start of FY 2022 and, on September 28, 2021, Treasury Secretary Yellen informed Congress that Treasury now estimates that the Federal government will reach the debt ceiling by October 18.  As a result, we again face the prospect of a government shutdown for lack of funding.  While Congress may yet take action, agencies across the government are likely to begin taking steps to prepare for a shutdown, and contractors should do so as well.

After 100 days in office, President Joe Biden has made it clear that he is not afraid to go it alone to pursue policy to match his campaign rhetoric and promises. The first 100 days of the administration were marked by a significant number of executive orders, a historic economic stimulus package passed with only Democratic support in Congress, and sweeping proposals that – if enacted – could transform everyday life for a significant number of Americans.

On April 7, 2020, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published a notice in the Federal Register requesting comments on federal procurement guidelines that designate products that are or can be produced with “recovered materials” and set forth recommended practices for purchasing such items. Recovered materials are those waste materials that have been recovered or diverted from the solid waste stream. The procurement guidelines are required under section 6002 of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), which established the “buy recycled” program to use Federal purchasing power to stimulate the demand for products made with recovered materials. Federal agencies, as well as state and local agencies and government contractors, that use appropriated funds to purchase $10,000 or more of designated items are required to purchase items containing recovered materials to the fullest extent possible. 

In the latest round of market research for the consolidation of Multiple Award Schedules (MAS), the General Services Administration (GSA) is inviting industry feedback on the new schedule structure of large categories, subcategories, and Special Item Numbers (SINs).  This new structure is part of GSA's effort to reduce administrative burdens on contractors, streamline offerings, and improve order-level competition.  While maintaining the same goods and services as offered on current schedules, GSA has proposed to organize the new schedule by large categories and subcategories similar to the current government-wide category structure, rewrite category descriptions, and remap the SINs under existing Schedules.  GSA has left intact the existing Transactional Data Reporting Rule, all Small Business Set Asides SINS,  and special terms and conditions unique to specific SINS.  Industry comments are due by July 12.

In late April, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) sent a letter to Congress, which contained a number of legislative proposals to streamline and improve the agility and efficiency of the federal acquisition process, one of which would establish an “Acquisition Modernization Test Board.” According to the letter, this Board would authorize the Administrator of the Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) “to exercise a waiver of one or more acquisition or procurement laws as part of a pilot program to evaluate how changing the statutory requirement(s) might facilitate more efficient achievement of the purpose underlying the law.” Importantly, this proposal would give OFPP enormous discretion and flexibility to pilot innovative and new approaches to streamlining and deregulating acquisitions. OMB seeks enactment of this and other proposals as part of Title 8 (the acquisition title) of the Fiscal Year 2020 National Defense Authorization Act, and, assuming that Congress approves this expanded authority for OFPP (either as part of an NDAA or otherwise), industry should take this opportunity to recommend innovative acquisition pilots. 

On April 30, 2019, the Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) issued its fourth Myth-Busting memorandum, the purpose of which is to:

On January 15, the Section 809 Panel released the final installment of its three-volume report, this time including recommendations on, among other topics, bid protests, contractor accounting systems, and government-industry interactions. (The panel released Volume 1 in January 2018 and Volume 2 in June 2018).

A partial shutdown of the federal government may begin at midnight Friday, December 21, as political tensions remain high and the House of Representatives is not scheduled to reconvene until Wednesday afternoon. Congress has passed only seven of twelve FY 2019 appropriations bills, meaning that a shutdown could affect a broad range of agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security, the General Services Administration, NASA, and the Departments of Justice, State, Commerce, Treasury, Agriculture, and Transportation, among others. Agencies for which Congress has passed an FY 2019 appropriations bill, and which therefore should experience little impact from the threatened shutdown, include the Departments of Defense, Veterans Affairs, Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Energy. 

The General Services Administration announced yesterday that it will consolidate the agency’s 24 Multiple Award Schedules into one single Federal Supply Schedule that includes both products and services. Through this consolidation, which GSA anticipates will take two years through a phased approach, the GSA intends to ease the process of purchasing for government customers, allowing for greater flexibility to combine products and services into a single combined solution. For government contractors, this combination is expected to ease the administrative burden associated with holding more than one schedule for multiple lines of businesses including products and/or services. We expect there will be more information in the coming months on this major reform; the GSA has already announced an industry day on December 12 from 9:30 – 2:45 EST when the consolidation will be discussed more broadly.

The Department of Defense (DoD) has issued a final rule amending the Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement (DFARS) and implementing sections of the National Defense Authorization Acts (NDAAs) for Fiscal Years 2013, 2016 and 2018. This final rule results from Congressional pressure to reduce barriers to entry for commercial contractors and streamline commercial item procurement procedures. But, while making specific changes required in the NDAAs intended to foster the DoD’s ability to purchase commercial items and services, the final rule retains unnecessary burdens that may continue to discourage commercial contractors from entering into the federal marketplace.

In the FY2016 NDAA, Congress created the “Section 809 Panel” to review and streamline DoD acquisition regulations to “improv[e] the efficiency and effectiveness of the defense acquisition process and maintain defense technology advantage.” On January 31, the Panel released its Volume 1 Report, which includes recommendations on a number of topics, such as commercial buying, contract compliance and audit, defense business systems, and services and small business contracting. (The Panel’s Volume 2 and 3 Reports will be released in June 2018 and January 2019, respectively.)

With yet another threat of a federal government shutdown, contractors must again prepare for the consequences. Although the issues that contractors will face under a shutdown may vary with the circumstances of individual contracts, there are a number of common considerations. Based on our experience under prior federal Government shutdowns, these include:

After a two-week reprieve, we again face the prospect of a government shutdown for lack of funding. Earlier this month, Congress provided short-term funding – through a continuing resolution – to buy more time for negotiation of FY 2018 appropriations bills. But the continuing resolution expires at midnight Friday night, and no deal has been reached. While Congress may yet take action, agencies across the government are taking steps to prepare for a shutdown, and contractors must too.

On March 13, 2017, the Trump Administration issued an executive order for a “comprehensive plan for reorganizing the executive branch[,]” which, according to its text, “is intended to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and accountability of the executive branch….” To this end, the Order directs agency heads, within 180 days of the date of the order, to submit to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget “a proposed plan to reorganize the agency, if appropriate, in order to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and accountability of that agency.” The OMB Director, in turn, must “propose a plan to reorganize governmental functions and eliminate unnecessary agencies…, components of agencies, and agency programs.” Notably, the OMB Director must “publish a notice in the Federal Register inviting the public to suggest improvements in the organization and functioning of the executive branch,” and must consider such suggestions when formulating the aforementioned plan.

In this issue:

On January 30, 2017, President Trump issued an Executive Order informing agencies that “for every one new regulation issued, at least two prior regulations” must “be identified for elimination.” Details of this are discussed more fully in our blog post. According to the Order, guidance on implementation will be forthcoming from the Director of the Office of Management and Budget.

On January 28, 2017, President Trump issued an executive order setting forth the ethics restrictions for its executive agency appointees. These restrictions, discussed more fully in our blog post, are simultaneously more restrictive and less restrictive than their 2009 Obama counterparts, and appear to be more focused on appointees’ conduct following their exit from Government rather than on their conduct preceding and during their appointments.