As the federal government focuses on securing reliable supplies of critical minerals, stockpiling has emerged as a key policy tool, alongside direct investments in private enterprises and expanded funding programs for industry.  The National Defense Stockpile (“NDS”) currently serves as the federal strategic reserve of materials needed for national defense, including critical minerals, and the growing policy attention has prompted new proposals and initiatives for upgraded federal stockpiling capabilities.  This blog post reviews the NDS and its activities last year and offers an outlook for critical minerals stockpiling in the year ahead.  Continue Reading Federal Push for Critical Minerals Stockpiling: 2025 in Review and Outlook for 2026  

The past month has marked a series of announcements from the Department of War (the “Department”) emphasizing rapid deployment of artificial intelligence (“AI”) industry partnerships.  These announcements signal opportunities for not only the defense industrial base, but also nontraditional defense contractors focused on technology and data.

On January 9, 2026, the Department released two key memoranda: (1) Artificial Intelligence Strategy for the Department of War, setting out measurable pace-setting projects, barrier removal authorities, and mandated data access; and (2) Transforming the Defense Innovation Ecosystem to Accelerate Warfighting Advantage, which aims to unify the defense innovation ecosystem under the Under Secretary of War for Research & Engineering as Chief Technology Officer (“CTO”).  

Shortly after, on January 12, Secretary Hegseth delivered a speech, presenting an overhaul of the Department’s innovation and acquisition ecosystems.

The January 9 memoranda and Secretary Hegseth’s speech signal the Department’s intent to formalize a single, CTO-led innovation operating system designed to produce three outputs: next-generation technology, scalable products, and new ways of fighting—and to do it at “wartime speed,” with AI as the first major proving ground.Continue Reading Pentagon Releases Artificial Intelligence Strategy

On December 11, 2025, the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (“CISA”) released its Cybersecurity Performance Goals 2.0 (“CPG 2.0”), an update to its core set of recommended cybersecurity practices for critical infrastructure owners and operators, which we previously wrote about here.  Established by the 2021 National Security Memorandum…

Continue Reading CISA Releases Cybersecurity Performance Goals 2.0 for Critical Infrastructure

On December 12, 2025, GAO released its Bid Protest Annual Report to Congress for Fiscal Year 2025, which provides bid protest statistics and other information regarding GAO’s protest system.Continue Reading GAO’s Annual Bid Protest Report: Fiscal Year 2025 Protest Filings Drop While the Effectiveness Rate Remains High

Among the most challenging areas of regulatory compliance for federal contractors are cost accounting and cost and pricing data disclosure requirements.  Indeed, many companies place guardrails on the nature and scale of their business relationships with the U.S. government precisely to avoid the application of these requirements.  In a move that seems consistent with the federal government’s push towards expanding the defense industrial base and working with more commercial companies, Congress recently released the final negotiated language of the FY 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (“NDAA”).  The draft text, currently awaiting a full Senate vote, contains impactful changes to reduce the applicability of federal Cost Accounting Standards (“CAS”) and the Truthful Cost or Pricing Data Statute (formerly the Truth in Negotiations Act, commonly referred to as “TINA”). Continue Reading FY26 NDAA Aims to Raise the Dollar Thresholds for the Applicability of CAS and TINA

After failing to be included in the Fiscal Year (“FY”) 2025 National Defense Authorization Act (“NDAA”) or passed as a standalone piece of legislation, the BIOSECURE Act has moved closer to finally being enacted after it was included in the final FY 2026 NDAA text released by Congress on December 7, 2025.  Section 851 of the FY 2026 NDAA is titled “Prohibition on Contracting with Certain Biotechnology Providers,” but includes in substance what was previously introduced and considered in Congress as the BIOSECURE Act. 

The bill has the potential to impose significant restrictions on the use of certain Chinese companies in the supply chain for products procured by the U.S. Government and accordingly has been of interest to industry over the last few years.  This blog post summarizes the scope of the bill, highlights the changes in the FY 2026 NDAA text as compared to prior iterations of the bill, and flags key considerations for government contractors in the life sciences space.Continue Reading BIOSECURE Act Moves Closer to Enactment with Inclusion in FY 2026 NDAA Text

Recently, in Cosette Pharmaceuticals, Inc. v. United States, the Court of Federal Claims sustained a bid protest, finding that the agency misapplied the Trade Agreements Act (“TAA”) during proposal evaluation.  That decision is a helpful reminder that the Court can be a hospitable forum for challenging an agency’s application of domestic sourcing regulations.Continue Reading COFC Reaffirms Domestic Sourcing Regulations as a Viable Basis for Bid Protests

As fiscal year (“FY”) 2025 closes, both the Armed Services Board of Contract Appeals (“ASBCA”) and Civilian Board of Contract Appeals (“CBCA”) released their annual reports.  Together, the two reports provide a useful snapshot of case volumes, outcomes, agency trends, and procedural developments.  We break down the findings and, most importantly, what they mean for contractors navigating claims and disputes in FY 2026.Continue Reading Top Five Trends and Takeaways from the FY 2025 ASBCA and CBCA Annual Reports

On November 7, 2025, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth used a speech at the National War College to unveil a Department of War (“DoW”) memorandum titled “Transforming the Defense Acquisition System into the Warfighting Acquisition System to Accelerate Fielding of Urgently Needed Capabilities to Our Warriors.”  This memorandum, referred to throughout as the “WAS Memo”—formally redesignates the Defense Acquisition System (“DAS”) as the Warfighting Acquisition System (“WAS”), places the acquisition enterprise on a “wartime footing,” and sets forth the governance, structural, and process reforms that will shape how DoW capabilities are acquired and fielded. 

This post is the second in a three-part series analyzing these reforms.  In our first post, we examined the WAS Memo’s new emphasis on commercial products and offerings as the preferred acquisition approach.  This post turns to the broader restructuring initiatives contained in the WAS Memo and its accompanying Acquisition Transformation Strategy.Continue Reading From DAS to WAS:  Secretary Hegseth’s Acquisition Overhaul and What It Means for Industry

As previously noted, although agency organizational conflict of interest (OCI) investigations are highly discretionary, that discretion is not boundless.  GAO’s recent sustain of an impaired objectivity OCI claim in Castro & Company, LLC, B-423689, Nov. 13, 2025, underscores that point, and highlights the need for contracting officers…

Continue Reading “Show Don’t Tell” — GAO Stresses the Importance of Adequately Documenting OCI Investigations