Lawmakers want answers about IRS Free File program

• The IRS pulled the plug on its free online tax filing platform. Members of the Senate say the agency's partnership with tax filing companies hasn’t stepped up. Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Angus King (I-Maine) are asking the IRS what it’s doing to promote its Free File program with tax preparation companies. The program saw a peak of about 5 million taxpayers in 2004, but has seen a decline in users since then. The number of companies participating in the program has also declined.
  (Letter to acting IRS Commissioner Scott Bessent - Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.))
• The Department of Health and Human Services is shutting down one of its research offices. HHS is effectively dismantling the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation at the Administration for Children and Families. That’s according to a joint statement from the Data Foundation and Results for America. Under a major restructuring, only mandated research is expected to continue. Work that remains will now require direct approval from political appointees. The office previously evaluated what works in programs like Head Start and child welfare programs.
  (Joint statement from the Data Foundation and Results for America on the restructuring of OPRE at ACF - Data Foundation )
• The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency will host a series of town halls this spring to help refine cyber incident reporting regulations. Last week, CISA announced that it would host public meetings through early April. The town halls will allow CISA to get more feedback on a proposed rule for the Cyber Incident Reporting for Critical Infrastructure Act (CIRCIA). That law will require critical infrastructure groups to report cyber attacks to CISA within 72 hours. But first, CISA has to finalize the regulations.
  (CIRCIA rulemaking townhalls - Federal Register)

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• The Treasury Department is on a fast track to bring AI tools to its workforce. The Treasury Department has more than 120 artificial intelligence use cases in its most recent inventory, updated last month. Of those, the agency has deployed only about 20 into production. Now, it wants to give its offices and bureaus direct access to large language models to help move those other use cases out of the pilot phase. In a new RFI, Treasury is seeking feedback from AI companies for how it can establish direct contractual relationships with them. The agency said that rather than buying a fixed set of tools or models through a one-time acquisition, it wants to explore a structure that provides sustained, direct access to frontier AI companies through a token-based procurement approach. Responses to the RFI are due by Feb. 23.
  (Treasury wants a new model to access AI tools - SAM.gov)
• A bipartisan group of lawmakers is renewing a push to penalize the Defense Department for failing to pass a clean audit. Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) and Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) introduced the Audit the Pentagon Act of 2026. The bill would require the Pentagon to return 0.5% of its budget to the Treasury after its first failed audit and forfeit 1% in subsequent years. The proposal exempts military personnel and health care funding from the automatic cuts. Similar legislation has been introduced repeatedly in the Senate, but none of those proposals has become law.
  (Lawmakers seek to penalize DoD if it fails to pass a clean audit - Federal News Network)
• The Department of Homeland Security kicked off the week in shutdown mode. About 90% of the more than 260,000 employees at DHS are working through the partial government shutdown. Congressional Democrats and the White House showed no signs of reaching a compromise on a funding deal for DHS through the weekend. That means airport screening officers at the Transportation Security Administration, cyber experts at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and Secret Service agents will be among those working without pay until the shutdown ends.
  (How a DHS shutdown affects different components and employees - Federal News Network)
• The Office of Federal Procurement Policy is reducing the number of training hours some contracting officers must obtain. In a new memo, OFPP tells acquisition workers under the Federal Acquisition Certification in Contracting, or FAC-C, category that they only need 80 hours of continuous learning credits every two years starting in 2026. This is down from 100 hours, which OFPP mandated in 2023 when it revamped acquisition workforce training. OFPP said it made this change based on feedback it received from the acquisition workforce. At the same time, OFPP said the continuous learning requirements for feds in the FAC-COR or FAC P/PM categories haven't changed.
  (OFPP reduces training requirements for FAC-C - Federal Acquisition Institute)
• The Defense Department is asking industry to recommend revisions to the Federal Acquisition Regulation and Defense FAR Supplement. The effort follows recent executive orders directing DoD to eliminate or revise unnecessary procurement regulations or any other internal guidance. DoD officials say initial rule changes have already reduced regulatory burdens on both the department and defense contractors. Additional feedback from the defense industrial base and acquisition stakeholders will help shape the next phase of what officials describe as a revolutionary overhaul of defense acquisition.
  (DoD seeks industry feedback on defense acquisition rule changes - Defense..gov)

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