Sens. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Mark Warner, D-Va., have introduced a bill to establish the Office of Critical Technologies and Security at the White House to mitigate national supply chain risks, Rubio’s office said Friday.

The proposed unit will oversee inter-agency coordination and develop a standardized, long-term strategy to implement supply chain regulations and protect the U.S. against technology theft by adversaries such as China.

Rubio said the bipartisan legislation will streamline the government’s efforts and provide a coordinated approach to countering threats to the nation’s critical networks and infrastructure.

Rubio and Warner previously sent a letter to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in October 2018 to reconsider Huawei’s participation in Canada’s 5G efforts.

Rubio also introduced a bill in September to strictly ensure ZTE’s full compliance with all probationary conditions under a deal with the Department of Commerce.

The two senators currently serve on the Senate’s Select Committee on Intelligence.

The lack of funding due to the ongoing partial government shutdown is already affecting some federal programs, including the government-wide information technology modernization under the President’s Management Agenda, FedScoop reported Friday. 

Administration officials have expressed concern that without permanent funding some agencies may soon be forced to stop key IT programs. 

“PMA quarterly goals are funded through multiple vehicles, so some goals may be unaffected by the lapse while others may, in fact, be affected,” a senior administration official told FedScoop. “Ultimately, we hope Congress takes action quickly to end the current lapse in appropriations for affected programs.”

Some of the programs at risk include technology asset management, workforce recruitment, cloud email adoption and the Technology Modernization Fund that already awarded $68.5M to federal IT modernization projects in 2018. 

TMF supports projects at the departments of Agriculture, Energy, Labor, Housing and Urban Development as well as the General Services Administration.

However, Energy and Labor may continue some IT efforts as the agencies operate under separate appropriations and are not affected by the shutdown. 

Ellen Lord, under secretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment, has announced plans to increase transparency of the Pentagon’s acquisition efforts following recent pressure from Congress, Bloomberg reported Friday.

The plan comes after lawmakers questioned the Navy for restricting access to information in a 2017 report on its multi-billion dollar Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carriers. 
 
The service stamped the report as “For Official Use Only,” which was previously open to the public during the Obama administration. 

To address concerns in Congress, Lord said her office is working on “a bunch of guidelines and internal rules” to promote transparency. 

The Department of Defense’s acquisition chief intends to encourage the agency to refrain from using the “For Official Use Only” designation in the reports, according to her spokesperson.

In October, Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, also expressed concern about the Trump administration’s “abuse of processes designed to keep the public informed about the weapons programs.”

He noted previously restricted reports contained information on failed systems.

The fiscal year 2019 defense policy bill already directed the DoD to reduce future Selected Acquisition Reports labeled for official use only, unless allowed by Congress. 

SAR provides lawmakers, defense analysts and journalists with information about the status of major government programs, including original estimated costs and delivery schedules.

The U.S. Navy has named upcoming Arleigh Burke-class destroyers after former senators Jeremiah Denton and Ted Stevens.

The USS Jeremiah Denton takes the name of a Vietnam war veteran who represented Alabama as a U.S. senator, the Navy said Friday.

Denton, a Navy Cross recipient, joined the military as a test pilot after graduating from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1947, and went on to develop tactical approaches that the service branch still applies.

Meanwhile, the USS Ted Stevens honors a former member of the Army Air Corps who served as senator for Alaska over a tenure of 41 years, the branch said in a separate announcement.

Both ships will measure 509 feet in length, and will undergo construction at Huntington Ingalls Industries shipbuilding facility in Pascagoula, Miss.

The guided missile destroyers will feature anti-air, surface and anti-submarine warfare equipment that are geared to function simultaneously.

President Donald Trump has sent a letter to congressional members to discuss illegal immigration and the importance of border security.

Trump presented statistical data about security and humanitarian crises at the Southern Border in the letter, according to a White House news release posted Friday.

He noted that the Customs and Border Protection and its agents arrested 17K individuals with existing criminal records in fiscal 2018 and that immigration courts now have a backlog of 800K cases.

“Effective border security must dramatically reduce the entry of illegal immigrants, criminals, and drugs; it must keep out terrorists, public safety threats, and those otherwise inadmissible under U.S. law; and it must ensure that those who do enter without legal permission can be promptly and safely returned home,” Trump noted.

He called on Congress to support the proposed border wall, eliminate the Flores Settlement Agreement and amend the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act to facilitate the return of smuggled minors into their countries.
 

The federal government’s partial shutdown is slated to run for a third week, affecting around 800,000 government employees and resulting in potential cash-flow deficit for contractors, Federal Times reported Friday.

Alan Chvotkin, executive vice president of the Professional Services Council, said a cash-flow shortage will result from contractors not getting paid by the government despite having workers needing to perform services under contract. Chvotkin noted that the financial impact of the shutdown will vary depending on the size and cash reserves of affected contractors, with small businesses facing greater risk.

Previously, the federal government experienced a 16-day shutdown in 2013 where some contractor employees were laid off and furloughed workers were not paid during or after the shutdown, the Government Accountability Office said in a report. Senate Democrats have pointed out that thousands of employees from the State Department, Internal Revenue Service and Department of Agriculture are working without pay.