As Summer Comes to a Close, So Does GAO’s Sustain Drought

In last month’s Bid Protest Sustain of the Month installment, we noted that GAO was suffering from a sustain drought, having failed to issue a single sustained protest decision in the month of July.  But it appears that drought is over!  The final tally for August shows that GAO issued a whopping six separate sustained protest decisions in August 2024.  Four of these decisions—issued at the end of the month—are still under Protective Orders, so we do not yet know the grounds for the sustains.  The remaining two involved less-common sustain issues: an offeror’s compliance with the Trade Agreements Act (TAA) and an agency’s compliance with the “Rule of Two.”  In HPI Federal, LLC, B-422583, the protester argued that some of an awardee’s offered products were not TAA compliant.  GAO sustained the protest, finding that the contractor had certified only that its products were “assembled” in Mexico, not that they were “an end product of Mexico.”