While busy season comes next month for contractors, it’s already here for Congress.  What the body is doing, or not doing, can impact your federal business.  These are three reasons why you should be paying attention:

1.  No, All the Appropriations Activity Doesn’t Mean We Will Have On-Time Spending Bills:  Yes, the House of Representatives is moving at break-neck speed to pass all 12 of its appropriations measures prior to summer recess.  That doesn’t mean, though, that the fiscal year will start on time.  The House-passed measures are likely going to have significant differences from their Senate counterparts. Plus, the Senate isn’t moving as quickly.  The timeline still suggests that a December start date is the best contractors can hope for.

2.  Mitigating Risk in AI Procurement:  A bill introduced by two Senators, The Promoting Responsible Evaluation and Procurement to Advance Readiness for Enterprise-wide Deployment (PREPARED) for AI Act, would be the first law to codify guardrails for the use of AI in public sector procurement, if passed.  The bill is a bi-partisan measure and would, among other things, mandate that government contracts for AI products and services include safety information regarding data ownership, civil rights, civil liberties, privacy and adverse incident reporting.

3.  Election Year Hearings and Politics:  While there is a lot of work to do, including passage of the FY’25 Defense Authorization Act, Congress is also allotting significant time to hearings that they hope will provide fodder for election year messaging.  Right now that means that Dr. Anthony Fauci is being grilled in both the House and Senate over COVID issues, that the House is threatening the Attorney General with a contempt of Congress action, and that some Senators believe that inflation is the fault of “greedy” companies.  All of these endeavors take away from “the business of the people”, but are inevitable when the Presidency, all of the House, and one-third of the Senate are up for grabs this Fall.  Contractors are reminded, though, that Congress can do things for you or to you.  As such, paying attention to their focus areas is important.