• The Defense Department’s contract obligations, payroll spending and grant awards across the country totaled $609.2 billion in fiscal 2023, which is equivalent to 2.2% of the United States GDP. Approximately 59% of that went to ten states, including Texas, Virginia, California, Connecticut and Florida. Top three states by defense grant spending are California, Maryland and Michigan. Top three states by defense contract spending are Texas, Virginia and California. Over $431 billion went to contracts for products and services and more than $167 billion was used for DoD personnel salaries.
  (Texas, Virginia and California are top states for defense spending - Department of Defense)
• Federal agencies should be able to accept mobile drivers licenses when the REAL ID Act is in force next year thanks to a new rule. The Transportation Security Administration will allow REAL ID Act waivers for state-issued mobile drivers licenses. TSA finalized that rule late last week. The REAL ID Act sets minimum standards for identification cards. Starting next May, federal agencies are only supposed to accept ID’s that comply with the standards. But since standards don't yet exist for mobile drivers licenses. TSA is allowing for waivers so they can continue to be accepted at airport security checkpoints and for other official purposes. Eleven states currently issue mobile drivers licenses.
  (REAL ID rule paves way for agencies to accept mobile drivers licenses - Federal News Network)
• President Joe Biden is directing defense and intelligence agencies to speed up their adoption of artificial intelligence. In a new national security memorandum signed out last week. Biden directs officials to study potential acquisition changes that could accelerate AI development and deployment. Biden also wants national security agencies to consider how nontraditional companies could more easily participate in government technology projects. Under the memo, a joint working group will have until next May to make recommendations to the Federal Acquisition Regulatory Council.
  (Sweeping AI memo directs potential acquisition changes - Federal News Network )
• The Defense Department has awarded over 80 task orders under its Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability contract. While the Defense Department is looking to ramp up JWCC Next shortly, the next phase of JWCC is still in the early discovery phase. Alee Long, the JWCC program manager at the DoD, said the advice and assist offering provided by the cloud service providers has been underutilized by mission partners. “I don't think we're communicating that out that our CSPs, offer this advisory and assist service. There's other things available that I think we just need to keep educating and communicating about.” Last month, DoD officials said JWCC Next will bring on more cloud providers.
  (Over 80 JWCC task orders awarded to date - AFCEA DC tech summit)

        Learn how federal agencies are preparing to help agencies gear up for AI in our latest Executive Briefing, sponsored by ThunderCat Technology.

• Agencies have new guidance to figure out how recent changes to civil service protections will look in practice. A final rule from the Biden administration earlier this year clarified that career federal workers cannot be made at-will employees without their express consent. It was meant to protect federal employees from the possibility of Schedule F returning in a future presidential administration. Now the Office of Personnel Management’s new guidance details how agencies should make sure that the rule is followed. The guidance explains, for example, which specific positions the protections apply to, and what employees’ appeals rights are if they are reclassified without their approval.
  (Implementing guidance for upholding civil service protections and merit system principles regulations - Office of Personnel Management)
• Federal union leaders continue to ask the Labor Department to go back to the bargaining table over return-to-office changes. Most bargaining unit employees at the Labor Department will have to work onsite at least half the time, beginning in December. Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su announced the coming changes earlier this month. But the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents those feds, is asking Su to reconsider, and look at options for employees that are not one-size-fits-all. In a letter to Su last week, AFGE said most impacted employees “strongly oppose” the coming return-to-office changes.
  (Letter to Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su - American Federation of Government Employees)
• The Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) is hiring a performance improvement officer to lead long-term workforce planning efforts. The leadership-level position will be responsible for measuring progress on MSPB’s efforts to boost workforce engagement and diversity. The performance improvement officer will also be expected to serve as a bridge to MSPB’s broader efforts to improve the agency’s performance. MSPB is accepting applications for the senior-level role through USAJobs.
  (Performance Improvement Officer job announcement - Merit Systems Protection Board)
• The Small Business Administration is proposing a major change to how agencies buy from task order contracts. SBA wants agencies to apply the rule of two for most multiple award task order contracts. In a new proposed rule, SBA said if this regulation is finalized, agencies would have to set-aside task orders if they expected two or more small firms to be able to competitively bid on the work. The proposed rule would implement the January memo from OFPP calling for an expansion of this authority. This requirement would not apply to GSA schedule buys as well as if agencies are addressing supply chain and national security risks. Comments on the proposed rule are due by Dec. 24.
  (SBA proposed rule to apply 'rule of two' to task order contracts - Federal Register)
• The General Services Administration (GSA) is adding 182 more small businesses to the OASIS-Plus award list. After choosing more than 750 small firms under three socioeconomic pools last month, GSA said 182 8(a) firms made the cut for a spot on the professional services multiple award contract. A majority of the 8(a) firms fall into one of two categories: management and advisory services or technical and engineering services. More awards to 8(a) firms may be in the works as GSA said it's evaluating bids on a rolling basis. The agency also will be opening an on-ramp in fiscal 2025 to continue to bring on companies of all sizes.
  (GSA awards 182 spots on the 8(a) pool under OASIS+ - SAM.gov)

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