Last week, the Federal Circuit heard oral argument in Global K9 Protection Group, LLC v. United States, a bid protest appeal concerning, in part, whether an awardee who chose not to intervene at the outset of the protest should have been allowed to do so after its award was enjoined.Continue Reading Worried Three’s a Crowd? Decline Intervention at Your Own Peril
GAO’s recent decision in Think Tank, Inc., serves as a critical warning for contractors and their counsel regarding the unforgiving nature of GAO filing deadlines. The decision highlights the potentially fatal consequence of missing even a minute on GAO’s filing calendar.Continue Reading Protester Files Comments Minutes Late, Resulting in Complete Dismissal of its Protest
The following is an installment in Crowell & Moring’s Bid Protest Sustain of the Month Series. Each month, Crowell’s Government Contracts Practice highlights notable bid protest sustain decisions. Below, Crowell Consultant (and former GAO Bid Protest Hearing Officer) Cherie Owen discusses two decisions where GAO rejected agency attempts at gamesmanship in the protest process.Continue Reading December 2025 Sustain of the Month: GAO Leans into Its Mandate to Protect the Integrity of the Procurement Process in Two Decisions Rebuffing Agency Gamesmanship
The following is an installment in Crowell & Moring’s Bid Protest Sustain of the Month Series. In this series, Crowell’s Government Contracts Practice keeps you up to date with a summary of one of the most notable bid protest sustain decisions each month. Below, Crowell Consultant (and former GAO Bid Protest Hearing Officer) Cherie Owen discusses GAO’s decision sustaining the protest of Castro & Company, LLC, which focused upon a firm’s organizational conflicts of interest.Continue Reading November 2025 Bid Protest Sustain of the Month: GAO Sustains OCI Where Awardee Was Providing Acquisition Support to the Source Selection Authority
Bid protest practitioners in recent years have witnessed agencies’ increasing efforts to limit the production of documents and information in response to Government Accountability Office (GAO) bid protests—often will little pushback from GAO. This practice has underscored the notable difference in the scope of bid protest records before GAO versus the Court of Federal Claims. However, in Tiger Natural Gas, Inc., B-423744, Dec. 10, 2025, 2025 CPD ¶ __, GAO made clear that there are limits to the scope of redactions, and GAO will sustain a protest where there is insufficient evidence that the agency’s actions were reasonable.Continue Reading GAO Cautions Agencies—Over-Redact at Your Own Peril
On December 12, 2025, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its annual report on bid protests for fiscal year 2025, containing the full statistics shown below:Continue Reading 2025 GAO Bid Protest Annual Report: Where Have All the Protests Gone?
The following is an installment in Crowell & Moring’s Bid Protest Sustain of the Month Series. In this series, Crowell Consultant (and former GAO Bid Protest Hearing Officer) Cherie Owen provides a monthly summary of a notable bid protest sustain decision. However, October 2025 was an unusual month: due to the government shutdown and lapse in appropriations, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) was closed for the entire month. Protesters could not file new protests, and GAO did not issue any decisions. While the Court of Federal Claims (COFC) remained open, the few protest decisions announced did not include any sustained protests. Sustain-less months are not unprecedented—we’ve previously noted similar droughts in May 2025, February 2025, July 2024, October 2023, and February 2023. Continue Reading October 2025 Bid Protest Sustain of the Month: Amid Shutdown Silence, A Look at COFC’s Prejudice Ruling
The following is an installment in Crowell & Moring’s Bid Protest Sustain of the Month Series. In this series, Crowell’s Government Contracts Group will keep you up to date with a summary of one of the most notable bid protest sustain decisions each month. Below, Crowell Consultant (and former GAO Bid Protest Hearing Officer) Cherie Owen discusses GAO’s decision sustaining the protest of Island Peer Review Organization, Inc., d/b/a IPRO.Continue Reading September 2025 Bid Protest Sustain of the Month: GAO Criticizes Agency’s Lack of Documentation, Highlighting the Importance of Contemporaneous Recordkeeping
As the government emerges from its recent shutdown, federal contractors—and their counsel—must prepare for a surge in bid protest activity, especially at the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and the Court of Federal Claims (COFC). The shutdown brought the regular bid protest process to a standstill, and its reopening is set to create unprecedented backlogs and overlapping deadlines. Here’s what contractors should anticipate in the coming days and weeks.Continue Reading Restarting the Protest Process: What Government Contractors Can Expect as the Shutdown Ends
Crowell & Moring’s “All Things Protest” podcast keeps you up to date on major trends in bid protest litigation, key developments in high-profile cases, and best practices in state and federal procurement. In this episode, Crowell attorneys cover impacts of the government shutdown on bid protests, GAO’s new pleading standards, and GAO’s dismissal of a