A $7.75 Million Omission: The FCA, Omissions, and False Claims Prosecutions
Sierra Nevada Company, LLC (SNC), the Sparks, Nevada aerospace and defense contractor, agreed on July 28, 2026 to pay $7.75 million to resolve False Claims Act (FCA) allegations. The problem was not a defective part or an inflated invoice. It was a conflict of interest that never made it onto the page. Â It was a […]
When “Too Low” Isn’t a Protest: Price Realism vs. Price Reasonableness in B-424336, Mustang Survival Manufacturing, Inc.
The distinction between price realism and price reasonableness continues to trip up even sophisticated protesters. GAO’s recent decision in B-424336 reinforces a familiar, but often misunderstood, rule: in order to challenge an agency’s failure to conduct a price realism analysis, the solicitation must expressly notify offerors that the agency may, as a part of its […]
GAO Dismisses Reconsideration Request in AAA General Contractors: A Reminder That Material Requirements Cannot Be Ignored
On March 6, 2026, the United States Government Accountability Office (“GAO”) issued its decision in AAA General Contractors, LLC—Reconsideration, B423842.7, dismissing a request to revisit an earlier protest denial involving the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ (“VA”) rejection of a proposal for failure to include a mandatory VAAR certification on subcontracting limitations. The case reinforces […]
Prosecuting False Claims in Defense Contracting
Safeguarding national security from fraud in an era where defense budgets are under intense scrutiny relies heavily on the integrity of the industrial base. In this environment, prosecuting false claims, under the False Claims Act (“FCA”), has become a critical tool for deterring fraud and ensuring taxpayer dollars support the Department of War (“DOW”) according […]
GAO Upholds Key Personnel Requirements in Oready Protest
On December 8, 2025, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) issued its decision in Oready, LLC, B423758, denying a pre-award protest that challenged solicitation terms requiring vendors to submit resumes and letters of commitment for key personnel. The case highlights GAO’s consistent deference to agencies when they justify requirements as reasonably necessary to meet mission needs. […]
Pass-Through Claims and Subcontractor Risk: Why the Subcontract Is the Case
Subcontractors on federal projects routinely assume that if the Government causes delay, disruption, or scope growth, their damages can simply be “passed through” the prime contractor and recovered later. In theory, pass-through claims are well established. In practice, they fail with surprising regularity—and almost never because the subcontractor was wrong on the facts. They fail […]
GAO’s Castro Decision: OCIs, Unstated Criteria, and Best-Value Discipline
The Government Accountability Office (“GAO”)’s November 13, 2025 decision in Castro & Company, LLC (B-423689) is the kind all federal contractors should have on their radar. The protest challenged a Federal Election Commission (“FEC”) blanket-purchase agreement award for audit and financial support services. GAO sustained the protest on three grounds: organizational conflicts of interest (“OCI”), […]
Publication is not a Panacea
Some people think publishing source code is sufficient to evade export controls. It is not. Publication on its own is never sufficient. While the International Traffic in Arms (“ITAR”) regulations indicate that information in the public domain that is published and that is generally accessible or available to the public is excluded from control as […]
Modesto Management, LLC, B-423728: When are you an “Interested Party” in a GAO post-award bid protest?
As of the time of this writing, the number of bid protest cases filed at GAO continues to tick downward over the past ten or so years. See Bid Protests: Key Features and Trends, GAO-25-108652, Jul 22, 2025, https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-25-108652 (last accessed October 21, 2025) (excerpt below). Why? Like everything else, lawyers are expensive. The win […]
When AI Backfires: GAO Dismisses Protests Over Fake Citations and Warns of Sanctions
The Government Accountability Office’s (GAO) bid protests and appropriation section is currently furloughed pending a resolution of the partisan bickering that has shutdown federal government. But on the other side of the agency pause button is a likely pressure cooker of protests ready to file day one when the GAO door reopens for business. Agency […]