Within hours of being sworn in as President on January 20, 2025, President Trump issued an executive memorandum[i] ordering the Executive Branch to implement a regulatory freeze on issuing any new rules or taking any regulatory actions pending a review by an appointee made by President Trump. This action is similar to actions taken by other Presidents on their first day in office.That action was followed on January 31, 2025, with Executive Order 14192, titled “Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation,” often referred to as the “Ten For One” Executive Order. Under this Order, whenever an agency promulgates a new rule, regulation, or guidance, it must identify at least ten existing rules, regulations or guidance to be repealed. In his first term, President Trump issued a similar Executive Order, but it only required a “two for one” offset.
In addition, on February 10. 2025, President Trump issued Executive Order 14208, titled “Ending Procurement and Forced Use of Paper Straws,” directing federal agencies to address, among other actions, contract policies that ban or penalize plastic straw purchase or use.
Regulatory Freeze Actions
Under the January 20 executive memorandum, in addition to the freeze on issuing any new rules or regulatory actions pending an affirmative approval by an appointee made by President Trump, the memo directs federal agencies to immediately withdraw for further review any rules already sent to the Federal Register for publication but that had not yet been published, and recommends postponing for 60 days the effective dates for any rules already published in the Federal Register which have not yet taken effect.
To date, the freeze has had a limited impact on federal acquisition regulations. Only four proposed FAR rules were published in January but they do not appear to be covered by the regulatory freeze.
On January 15, 2025, the FAR Council published the long-awaited proposed FAR rule on “controlled unclassified information,” with comments due by March 17, 2025.[ii] The proposed rule implements in the FAR the National Archives and Records Administration’s September 14, 2016, Controlled Unclassified Information Program enacted under Executive Order 13556 titled “Controlled Unclassified Information.” Comments are due by March 17, 2025. DoD has already implemented these CUI requirements through DFARS 252.204–7012, “Safeguarding Covered Defense Information and Cyber Incident Reporting (May 2024),” and as a precursor to future DFARS final rules regarding Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) contractual requirements.
On January 15, 2025, the FAR Council published another long-anticipated, but first version of, a proposed FAR rule titled “Preventing Organizational Conflicts of Interest in Federal Acquisition”[iii] to implement a statute titled “Preventing Organizational Conflicts of Interest in Federal Acquisition Act,” that was enacted December 27, 2022.[iv] Comments on this rule are due by March 17, 2025.
Also on January 15, 2025, the FAR Council published a proposed FAR rule titled “Small Business Participation on Certain Multiple-Award Contracts,”[v] to provide policy on small business participation on certain multiple-award contracts. Comments on this proposed rule are due by March 17, 2025.
In addition, on January 15, 2025, the FAR Council published a proposed FAR rule titled “Protests of Orders Under Certain Multiple-Award Contracts,” to clarify protest rights for orders set aside under certain multiple-award contracts. Comments on this proposed rule are also due by March 17, 2025.
Since the regulatory freeze was issued, only one acquisition rule was published in the Federal Register. On February 18, 2025, the Small Business Administration published a final rule, effective February 18, 2025, making correcting amendments to the December 17, 2024, final SBA rule titled “HUBZone Program Updates and Clarifications, and Clarifications to Other Small Business Programs”[vi] that became effective on January 16, 2025.[vii]
Further, DoD published a DFARS class deviation on February 7, 2025, titled “Class Deviation – Waiver of Project Labor Agreement Requirements,”[viii] which was effective immediately, and that directs DoD contracting officers to not use project labor agreements for large-scale construction projects, including removing such requirements from solicitations. Also on February 7, GSA published two class deviations, one relating to “Ending Illegal Discrimination in Federal Contracting,” (relating to the prohibition on DEI contracting) and one relating to “promoting sustainable procurement (relating to the forced use of paper straws).
Of particular interest is the quote from FAS Commissioner Gruenbaum in the GSA February 18, 2025, press release announcing these deviations:
The FAR has grown to more than 2,000 pages – it’s burdensome, outdated, and doesn’t allow agencies to buy at the speed of need, which leads to poor outcomes for the public we serve. The time is now to streamline the FAR to better align with commercial practices. GSA looks forward to working with the members of the FAR Council on this important work.[ix]
Regulatory Reform
On January 31, 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order 14192, “Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation.”[x] Section 1 of the Order states that “for each new regulation issued, at least 10 prior regulations are to be identified for elimination. Section 3 of the Order establishes for the current Federal Fiscal Year 2025 a new cap on the total incremental cost of all new regulations, including repealed regulations, at “significantly below zero” as determined by OMB. OMB is directed to provide guidance to federal agencies for the measurement and estimation of regulatory costs. In addition, in Section 4 of the Order, each agency is required to identify in its Fiscal Year 2026 and thereafter annual Regulatory Plans its best approximation of the total costs or savings associated with each new regulation or repealed regulation. OMB is to provide guidance to federal agencies in making these determinations, including revising OMB Circular A-4 to reinstate the version issued on September 17, 2003. Section 5 provides an expanded definition of the term “regulations” and “rules,” while also providing exemptions from the Order to rules covering the military, national security, homeland security, foreign affairs, immigration, and other categories as approved by the OMB Director. Rules that are required by law could incorporate multiple deregulatory actions or even qualify for an OMB exemption from certain elements of the Order.
In the first Trump term, the implementation of the then-required “two for one” provision held up acquisition rulemaking for weeks as OMB developed the necessary guidance and agencies learned how to apply it to specific rules. While the prior OMB guidance will likely be quickly reinstated, it will still take agencies some time to apply it to the current environment of issuing new rules to implement Trump Administration policies while also meeting the deregulation mandate. But the long-term impact of the “ten for one” Order is likely to have a greater impact on federal acquisition policies, including efforts to streamline and simplify federal buying practices within specific agencies and across the Federal Government.
Plastic Straws
As noted above, on February 10, 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order 14208, titled “Ending Procurement and Forced Use of Paper Straws,” setting U.S. policy to end the use of paper straws.[xi] The Order directs agencies to eliminate policies designed to disfavor the use of plastic straws, and directs the assistant to the President to issue a national strategy to end the use of paper straws, including addressing contract policies and terms with that ban or that penalize plastic straw purchase or use.
Conclusion
The regulatory environment for acquisition rules has been reset by these Trump Administration actions; while the near-term impact on federal acquisition regulations is minor, the “ten-for-one” rule and the reinstatement of the OMB guidance from the first Trump presidential term will likely have a more significant impact on both the timing and the substance of future acquisition rules. In the interim, watch for numerous agency “class deviations” from the FAR and revisions to pending and new solicitations to incorporate these policy directives. The February 18 comments from the GSA FAS Commissioner are a likely bell-weather for what government agencies and contractors should expect.
If you have any questions or need any additional information, please do not hesitate to contact the author at [email protected] or the Centre Law attorney with whom you normally work.
[i] “Regulatory Freeze Pending Review,” January 20, 2025, available at https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/regulatory-freeze-pending-review/. Last reviewed Feb 18, 2025.
[ii] Controlled Unclassified Information,” January 15, 2025, available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2025-01-15/pdf/2024-30437.pdf. Last reviewed Feb 18, 2025.
[iii] “Preventing Organizational Conflicts of Interest in Federal Acquisition,” January 15, 2025, available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2025-01-15/pdf/2024-31561.pdf. Last reviewed Feb 18, 2025.
[iv] Pub. L. 117–324, 41 U.S.C. 2303 note; enacted Dec 27, 2022; available at https://www.congress.gov/117/plaws/publ324/PLAW-117publ324.pdf. Last viewed Feb 18, 2025.
[v] “Small Business Participation on Certain Multiple-Award Contracts,” January 15, 2025, available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2025-01-15/pdf/2025-00615.pdf. Last viewed Feb 18, 2025.
[vi] HUBZone Program Updates and Clarifications, and Clarifications to Other Small Business Programs; Correction, February 18, 2025, available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2025-02-18/pdf/2025-02741.pdf. Last viewed Feb 18, 2025.
[vii]“HUBZone Program Updates and Clarifications, and Clarifications to Other Small Business Programs; December 17, 2024, available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2024-12-17/pdf/2024-29393.pdf. Last viewed Feb 18, 2025.
[viii] “Class Deviation – Waiver of Project Labor Agreement Requirements,” DFARS 2025-O0002 (February 7, 2025), but not available electronically on the DoD website as of February 18, 2025.
[ix] GSA Class Deviation 2025-04 Supplement 1: “Revoked Executive Order 11246, Equal Employment Opportunity” (February 18, 2025), available at https://www.gsa.gov/system/files/CD-2025-04%20w%20S1.pdf; and GSA Class Deviation 2025-05: “FAR Class Deviation” (February 18, 2025,) available at https://www.gsa.gov/system/files/CD-2025-05%20print_0.pdf. See also GSA February 18, 2025, press release “GSA announces FAR class deviations, guidance for contracting officers,” available at https://www.gsa.gov/about-us/newsroom/news-releases/gsa-announces-far-class-deviations-guidance-for-contracting-officers-02182025?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govDelivery. Last viewed Feb 19, 2025.
See a link to Executive Order 14208, infra, at endnote xi.
[x] Executive Order 14192 (Jan 31, 2025), available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2025-02-06/pdf/2025-02345.pdf. Last viewed Feb 18, 2025.
[xi] Executive Order 14208 (Feb 10, 2025), available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2025-02-14/pdf/2025-02735.pdf. Last viewed Feb 18, 2025.
