On April 13, 2011, the Obama administration released a draft executive order called “Disclosure of Political Spending by Government Contractors.” This executive order, if implemented, would instruct the FAR Councils to amend the FAR to require significant disclosures about contractor political contributions to be made as part of any proposal submitted by a firm seeking a federal contract. The disclosures would not only cover the contributions by the company itself, but also the company’s affiliates, the company’s political action committees, and the individual contributions of all officers and directors:

(a) All contributions or expenditures to or on behalf of federal candidates, parties or party committees made by the bidding entity, its directors or officers, or any affiliates or subsidiaries within its control; and

(b) Any contributions made to third party entities with the intention or reasonable expectation that parties would use those contributions to make independent expenditures or electioneering communications.

The disclosure obligation would kick in any time the aggregate amount of contributions given to a single source reach $5000 and the information collected would be posted of the Data.gov website so that the public could access the information. 

In the six weeks since this draft executive order was released, there has been significant backlash from industry. A wide array of trade associations and business advocacy groups, including the Professional Services Council, the Aerospace Industries Association, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, have chimed in to vigorously oppose the proposed order. At the same time, watchdog groups of applauded the proposed Order as an example of increased transparency in the area of federal contracting. 

While the Obama administration has assured critics that the information collected would not be considered as part of the evaluation of proposals (beyond the threshold issue of whether the certification of full disclosure was completed), questions persist about whether the draft Order would cause exactly the situation it seeks to avoid—injecting politics into the federal contracting system by providing competitive decision-makers with information they would not otherwise have possessed in the regular course of business. Other entities are concerned about the chilling effect this draft Order would have on political contributions by individuals at the company, whose personal political interests may have little or nothing to do with the interests of the employer. 

In the last week, groups of Republicans in both the House and Senate, led by Darrell Issa (R-California) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) respectively, have introduced legislation called the Keeping Politics Out of Federal Contracting Act of 2011, which would effectively preempt the draft Obama Executive Order by prohibiting federal agencies from collecting the political contribution information of contractors and their employees as part of a federal procurement. The statute would also prohibit federal agencies from using political affiliation or contribution information received from any source as a factor in the award of federal contracts. 

We will keep our readers apprised as the situation continues to develop.