• The Treasury Department said an IRS hiring freeze is possible if Congress doesn’t address a $20 billion budget anomaly. The IRS already saw a $20 billion cut to its modernization fund. But Treasury officials said the continuing resolution keeping current government spending levels in place may have inadvertently duplicated those cuts. The CR expires Dec. 20. If lawmakers pass another CR Treasury officials say they’d need to add language to prevent another $20 billion cut. An omnibus spending deal for the rest of the fiscal year would also avoid these duplicative cuts.
  (IRS hiring freeze looms, if Congress doesn’t fix $20B budget anomaly, Treasury warns - Federal News Network)
• A recent Pentagon report on political extremism in the armed forces may be underestimating the problem – partly because it relied on old data. That’s according to a new data analysis by the Associated Press. The official report, conducted by the Institute for Defense Analyses, examined arrest records from the January 6th insurrection, and found less than 12% of the people charged had military backgrounds. But the report was based only on arrests through January of 2022. When more recent prosecutions are added to the mix, AP found the actual figure is 18%.
  (Report on political extremism in the armed forces - Associated Press)
• President-elect Donald Trump’s transition officials have reached an agreement with the Biden administration on transition planning efforts. The memorandum of understanding that was signed Tuesday will let Trump’s transition team work directly with agencies and federal staff ahead of Inauguration Day. Trump’s team, however, is declining to sign an agreement with the General Services Administration to get access to office space and secure email accounts. The agreement with the White House comes after nearly two months of delay it was supposed to be signed by Oct. 1. Still, the Partnership for Public Service called this week’s agreement a positive step for a peaceful transition of power and the ability to govern on day one in office.
  (MOU signed between transition team and Biden White House - Trump-Vance transition team)
• The Air Force still has some work to do when it comes to rebuilding readiness. A Government Accountability Office study on the service’s new Air Force Force Generation process finds the model hasn’t been fully implemented. The idea is to build units that train and deploy together, but the Air Force hasn’t been able to fully accomplish that – partly because some of those units’ personnel are still needed to staff U.S. bases. GAO said the Air Force won’t be able to fully implement AFFORGEN until it has a better grasp on its base staffing needs.
  (Air Force Force Generation process - Government Accountability Office)

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• The Department of Veterans Affairs has a new, lower estimate for its health care budget shortfall. The VA now expects it will need about 6-and-a-half billion dollars from Congress before the end of fiscal 2025. That’s roughly half the $12 billion dollar shortfall prediction it gave lawmakers this summer. The new estimate is lower in part because the Veterans Health Administration is paying fewer retention incentives to its employees. Under Secretary for Health Shereef Elnahal said VHA needs the supplemental funding to keep growing its workforce and keep up with the rising cost of prescription drugs. ELNAHAL: “We’re breaking records on care delivery, and we've seen an increase in costs because of all of that.”
  (VA updates FY 2025 health care budget shortfall to $6.6B, nearly half its previous estimate - Federal News Network)
• The Department of the Navy is seeking its next chief technology officer to join the office of the chief information officer. The CTO will be instrumental in advising senior leadership on the integration, modernization, and adoption of technology across the Navy. This role will influence enterprise-wide policies, processes, and technological solutions, ensuring they align with both Navy and Department of Defense (DoD) missions and objectives. Justin Fanelli currently serves as the acting CTO for the Department of the Navy. Applications are due by Dec. 4.
  (Navy is seeking new chief technology officer - USAjobs)
• Supply chain disruptions impacting satellite programs reveal deeper vulnerabilities within the defense industrial base. The Space Development Agency’s low Earth orbit program highlights the difficulties contractors are having scaling up the production and manufacturing capabilities. Space Systems Command chief Lt. Gen. Philip Garrant said while supply chain challenges were initially attributed to the pandemic. “I would say coming out of COVID, we thought a lot of these supply chain issues were COVID issues. And I think what we’re realizing is it’s probably more than COVID there are true industrial base concerns.” The Defense Department’s efforts to revitalize the defense industrial base are still in its early stages.
  (Pentagon grapples with deeper defense industrial base vulnerabilities - Federal News Network )
• After some recent successes, the Office of Personnel Management said Federal Executive Boards are ready to expand their support. In the last year, the FEB program connected tens of thousands of feds outside the D.C. area. It also reached nearly 8 million dollars in cost savings. FEBs operate in 28 different locations across the country. Federal executives who serve on the boards discuss goals for improving the federal workforce and host various training sessions. OPM said the FEB program’s recent restructuring will help broaden each board’s reach, as well as the number of executives who work with FEBs.
  (FEBs seek to offer resources to more federal employees - Federal News Network)

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