The Federal Acquisition Regulatory Council recently issued an interim rule amending the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to implement Executive Order 14026 “Increasing the Minimum Wage for Federal Contractors” and a final rule issued by the Department of Labor. The Executive Order “seeks to raise the hourly minimum wage paid by contractors to workers performing
Miller Act Suit Stayed until CDA Remedies Exhausted
A federal district court in Washington recently rejected a subcontractor’s motion for reconsideration of a previously granted motion to stay in a Miller Act lawsuit (the Miller Act governs prime contractor bond requirements on federal projects and sets forth remedies against the bond for subcontractors, vendors, and suppliers on such projects). In United States of
Inside DOJ’s New Cyber-Fraud Initiative
The Department of Justice (DOJ) recently announced the launch of the Civil Cyber-Fraud Initiative, which will utilize the False Claims Act (FCA) to pursue cybersecurity-related fraud by government contractors and grant recipients. Key features of and takeaways from this new initiative are discussed below.
Key Features
- The initiative aims to hold accountable entities or individuals
WOSB/EDWOSB Amendments to the FAR Are Here
The Department of Defense (DoD), the General Services Administration (GSA), and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) recently proposed a series of noteworthy amendments to the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) that impact Women-Owned Small Business (WOSB) concerns and Economically Disadvantaged Women-Owned Small Business (EDWOSB) concerns. The key proposed amendments to the FAR — which
Uncle Sam Wants You! (To Get Vaccinated, If You’re a Federal Contractor): Updated COVID-19 Workplace Safety Guidelines Are Here
As promised, on September 24, 2021, the Safer Federal Workforce Task Force issued Guidance for Federal Contractors and Subcontractors about the implementation of President Biden’s Executive Order 14042, which imposed a vaccine mandate on many federal contractors. Bottom line up front, as the military likes to say, Uncle Sam wants its federal contractors to
Afghanistan Withdrawal: The Government Contractor’s Guide to Terminations for Convenience
With the United States’ recent withdrawal from Afghanistan, it is only a matter of time before the government begins terminating certain federal contracts for the convenience of the government. Accordingly, government contractors need to know their rights and obligations so that they can be best positioned if one or more of their contracts are terminated.
New Vaccine Requirements for Federal Contractors
The Biden administration recently announced that “every federal government employee and onsite contractor will be asked to attest to their vaccination status,” and that anyone who “does not attest to being fully vaccinated will be required to wear a mask on the job no matter their geographic location, physically distance from all other employees and
FAR Limitation on Subcontracting Rules Are Finally Here!
In 2016, the Small Business Administration (SBA) updated its regulations pertaining to limitations on subcontracting. Five years later, on August 11, 2021, the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Council finally followed suit by publishing two final rules that largely mirror the SBA’s rules. This is a welcome development for federal contractors, as the discrepancy between the
CICA Violated Where Sole-Source Award Duration Was Too Long
The U.S. Court of Federal Claims (COFC), in Sierra Nevada Corporation v. United States, recently held that a contracting agency’s justification of a sole-source contract award ran afoul of the Competition in Contracting Act (CICA) because the duration of the sole-source contract was longer than reasonably necessary. The COFC’s decision in this case is
Enforcing Electronic Contracts in Texas When the Other Party Denies Signing
As an ever-increasing amount of contract negotiation and execution is done online, new legal issues have arisen from such transactions. Consider the following scenario:
You are a general/prime contractor. You have a subcontractor’s electronic signature on an arbitration agreement. When a dispute arises with the subcontractor, you raise the arbitration agreement and attempt to submit