• Two government contractors agree to pay a total of $4.3 million to settle allegations that they violated the False Claims Act and forced the Army to overpay for IT hardware. The Justice Department said Dell Technologies and Iron Bow will each pay more than $2 million to resolve a Qui Tam lawsuit. DoJ said Dell and Iron Bow allegedly conspired to collude on solicitations under the Army's AMDC-3 contract. Justice said from 2020 to 2024 Dell operated a deal registration program, whereby it gave advantageous pricing to Iron Bow to sell certain Dell computer hardware products and then also submitted their own direct bids on the same solicitations that were more costly.
  (Dell, Iron Bow agree to pay $4.3M to resolve False Claims Act allegations - Justice Department)
• The Office of Personnel Management has a new leader to focus specifically on federal employees working in HR. Jeff Bardwell will be the first-ever senior executive to serve as the advisor for human resources workforce programs at OPM. In the new position, Bardwell will be tasked with developing and managing the direction of the HR workforce governmentwide. His work will likely include defining HR career paths and improving HR training and professional development opportunities. Bardwell previously spent 15 years working at the Department of Homeland Security.
  (New advisor for HR workforce programs - Office of Personnel Management)
• A multi-billion-dollar shortfall at the Department of Veterans Affairs isn’t as severe as its previous estimate. VA officials told Congress this summer the department faced a $15 billion shortfall. Lawmakers recently approved a $3 billion emergency spending bill so the department could keep making disability compensation and pension benefit payments through the end of September. But the VA said it didn’t need run out of benefits funding at the end of fiscal 2024 as officials had feared. They said the department still faces a budget shortfall for its health care operations. But their previous $12 billion request is an “overestimate.”
  (VHA says $12B budget shortfall is ‘overestimate,’ still needs more funding to keep hiring - Federal News Network)
• A governmentwide watchdog group is naming a new leader. Mike Ware the inspector general of the Small Business Administration and the acting IG of the Social Security Administration will serve as the next chairman of the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency. Ware will start his two-year term as chairman starting in January. As SBA’s top watchdog he oversaw more than a trillion dollars of lending authority at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
  (The honorable Hannibal “Mike” Ware elected chairperson of the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency - Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency)

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• House appropriators are digging into the Social Security Administration’s telework policies. GOP leaders on an appropriations subcommittee said the agency’s requirement of two to three in-person days per week is not enough to meet customer service needs. But during a hearing yesterday, SSA Commissioner Martin O’Malley pushed back, saying that productivity levels have increased in a hybrid work environment. He added that the agency has multiple methods for holding employees accountable for their work, regardless of where they’re sitting.
  (In final pitch, O’Malley highlights ‘deep concerns’ for SSA before his resignation next week - Federal News Network)
• A GSA legislative priority makes it past a key Senate hurdle. GSA is one step closer to making the schedule contracts based on best value instead of lowest price. The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee passed the Value Over Cost Act yesterday. The bill would alleviate long-time confusion over the language that created the schedules program in 1984 that called for “lowest overall cost alternative,” which has been interpreted as lowest cost, technically acceptable. Instead, the bill establishes a “best value” standard for the schedules. The House passed the bill on Nov. 12. Now the bill heads to the full Senate for a vote or could be attached to the Defense authorization bill.
  (HSGAC legislative markup - Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee)
• A bill to reform the Federal Acquisition Security Council is gaining steam in Congress. The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee passed the FASC Improvement Act on Wednesday. That comes after the House passed the legislation earlier this week. The bill would transfer the FASC to the White House Office of the National Cyber Director. And it would give Congress the ability to direct the council to investigate specific suppliers. The FASC was established in 2018 to improve the security and resiliency of federal supply chains.
  (HSGAC business meeting - HSGAC )
• An unexpected legal challenge to the Defense Department’s multibillion dollar household goods moving contract. The Global Household Goods contract has already survived several years of bid protests. But now the contract is finally being implemented, the Suddath Companies, one of the military’s biggest incumbent moving firms, has filed another one. Details of the lawsuit are still under seal at the Court of Federal Claims, but in a statement, the company said the case is about getting a “free and fair opportunity” to keep doing moving work for DoD. Suddath was previously part of a partnership that won the GHC contract, but that award was overturned in an earlier bid protest.
  (Legal challenge to the Defense Department’s multibillion dollar household goods moving contract. - Court of Federal Claims docket)
• There’s a new idea on Capitol Hill to help smaller defense contractors worried about the Pentagon’s impending cybersecurity certification program. A draft bill in the House would provide a $50,000 tax credit for smaller businesses that need a Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification assessment. Companies with 50 or fewer employees would be eligible. The tax credit could help cover the costs of the assessment, as well as closing any cybersecurity gaps after assessment. Backers of the bill hope it will factor into a tax package Republicans are expected to take up early next year.
  (DoD, Hill eye CMMC tax credit for smaller defense contractors - Federal News Network)
• The Space Force is building a human resources ecosystem that can support both part-time and full-time Guardians. The Space Force Personnel Management Act signed into law last year allows active-duty Guardians and Air Force reservists to serve in a full- or part-time capacity. For the next four years, the service will focus on building a modern IT ecosystem that can support this fundamentally different way of talent management. So far, the service only managed to move Air Force reservists to the Space Force as full-time Guardians. The service is also working on creating a promotion system that accommodates part-time Guardians.
  (Space Force to address HR, promotion challenges before bringing in part-time Guardians - Federal News Network)
• The Pentagon has picked seven companies to build software for Replicator, the department’s program to field thousands of cheap drones by August 2025. Two efforts got funded under Replicator — Opportunistic, Resilient and Innovative Expeditionary Network Topology, known as ORIENT, and Autonomous Collaborative Teaming, known as ACT. ORIENT’s focus is on improving resilience of command and control for autonomous systems. ACT software will enable automated coordination of large-scale swarms of un-crewed systems. The announcement comes after the Pentagon unveiled several hardware awards last week.
  (Pentagon picks software companies to support Replicator - Defense Innovation Unit)

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