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Executive Order

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On September 9, 2021, President Biden rolled out his Path Out of the Pandemic plan (the “Plan”) to combat the spread of COVID-19. As reported in an earlier alert, this Plan contains a number of moving parts and coverage that remains to be finalized.  Of note to government contractors is the fact that the Plan includes (1) an instruction to the Department of Labor Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to issue a directive that requires companies with 100 or more employees to ensure their workforces are either fully vaccinated or their workers test negative for COVID-19 on a weekly basis before coming to work, and (2) an Executive Order on Ensuring Adequate COVID Safety Protocols for Federal Contractors (EO) that requires contractors and subcontractors at any tier to comply with all guidance published by the Safer Federal Workforce Task Force, and determined to “promote economy and efficiency in Federal contracting” by the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, for those contractor or subcontractor workplace locations where individuals are “working on or in connection with a Federal Government contract or contract-like instrument.”  The Plan and, in particular, these two prongs leave much to be defined and implemented.  The devil truly will be in the details of the rules to be prepared and issued, as well as in whether and when the OMB, individual agencies, and contracting and agreements officers determine to roll them out to all, or a portion, of Federal government contractors.
Continue Reading Biden Executive Order on Ensuring Adequate COVID Safety Protocols for Federal Contractors –A Number of Questions

Published on June 9, 2021, President Biden’s Executive Order on Protecting America’s Sensitive Data from Foreign Adversaries is the latest Executive Order seeking to strengthen national security by improving public and private sector capabilities and practices relating to cybersecurity and supply chain risks. As explained in a previous article, the first such Executive Order addressed five main areas. The latest Executive Order focuses primarily on protecting against risks “associated with connected software applications that are designed, developed, manufactured, or supplied by persons owned or controlled by, or subject to the jurisdiction or direction of, a foreign adversary.” However, unlike prior Executive Orders on the topic, it expands the scope of threat actors to be addressed in future to include those “persons who engage in serious human rights abuse,” noting, “If persons who own, control, or manage connected software applications engage in serious human rights abuse or otherwise facilitate such abuse, the United States may impose consequences on those persons in action separate from this order.”
Continue Reading Biden’s Executive Order on Protecting Americans’ Sensitive Data from Foreign Adversaries

As a preface to this blog, I recently gave a presentation with Nate Picarsic and Emily de la Bruyere at the American Bar Association Public Contract Law Section Fall Procurement Symposium on “China’s Military-Civil Fusion Strategy Supply Chain Implications.” China’s Military-Civil Fusion strategy poses increasing threats to our defense supply chain. Countries and entities around…

On August 3, 2020, the president issued Executive Order No. 13940 on Aligning Federal Contracting and Hiring Practices with the Interests of American Workers. As indicated by the title of the order, the purported underlying policy is to create opportunities, particularly in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, for American workers to compete for federal contracting…