The Small Business Administration has issued a formal letter of warning reminding government contracting officers to report suspected fraud, waste and abuse. According to SBA Administrator Kelly Loeffler, the notice represents the agency’s commitment to strengthening its oversight of the SBA 8(a) Business Development Program.
“Our 8(a) contracting officers have a legal responsibility to uphold the law and protect taxpayer dollars, ensuring that federal awards go to legitimate, eligible small businesses,” the official said. “Today, we’re putting them on notice – that we will no longer tolerate the self-dealing and fraud that was allowed to proliferate under the Biden Administration.”
The 8(a) program provides training and technical assistance to socially and economically disadvantaged small business owners. It also opens up opportunities for small businesses to work with government agencies and enter the federal marketplace.
DOJ Uncovers SBA Fraud
The letter follows a Department of Justice investigation of the 8(a) Business Development Program that revealed fraud and bribery schemes involving federal contracts. According to the investigation, over $550 million in federal contracts were fraudulently awarded by a contracting officer from the U.S. Agency for International Development. One federal contractor involved in the scheme received $800 million in contracts, even after it was flagged by USAID for its lack of “honesty or integrity.”
Loeffler has already ordered a full-scale audit of the business development program. The audit will look at high-dollar and limited-competition contracts issued in the past fifteen years.
“Effective immediately, I am launching a full-scale audit of the program to stop bad actors from making the kind of backroom deals that have already cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars,” the official said at the time. “We must hold both contracting officers and 8(a) participants accountable – and start rewarding merit instead of those who game the system.”
Related Articles
The Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday voted 26-3 to pass a bill that would appropriate $851.9 billion in discretionary defense funding for fiscal year 2026. Weapons Systems Procurement The committee said Thursday the proposed FY 2026 Defense Appropriations Act would allocate $171.3 billion for weapon systems procurement and $140.5 billion for platform research, development and testing. The measure includes a $280 million increase in funding for F-135 spare engines and an additional $500 million for F-35 sustainment spare parts; an additional $216 million for drone and counter-drone tech capabilities; $4.6 billion more for air and missile defense efforts; and a
NASA wants to team up with industry to develop advanced space technologies for future commercial or government use. The space agency on Wednesday issued an announcement of collaboration opportunity, or ACO, to solicit partnership proposals. Managed by the Space Technology Mission Directorate, the ACO gives industry partners access to NASA subject matter expertise, facilities, software and hardware to accelerate and enhance capability development. According to NASA, the ACO will be open for five years and will serve as an umbrella opportunity for topic-specific appendices that would be released every six to 12 months to address evolving needs. For the 2025
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., head of the Department of Health and Human Services, and other government and healthcare technology leaders have committed to delivering a patient-centric digital health ecosystem. At an event hosted by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services at the White House, over 60 companies pledged to collaborate and deliver results that benefit the public in the first quarter of 2026. Meanwhile, 11 health systems and providers said they will support patient use. Seven electronic health record companies pledged to facilitate data exchange. According to Kennedy, bureaucrats and entrenched interests have made health data inaccessible to patients,