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Franklin Turner

Mr. Turner is a Partner and Co-Leader of the Government Contracts & Export Controls Practice Group. He is an innovative business lawyer with significant experience resolving complex government contracts issues for a broad array of companies – ranging from multinational, multibillion-dollar Fortune 500 corporations in the aerospace, defense, technology, health care and industrial supply sectors to small business intelligence and security services providers.

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What Federal Contractors Should Be Watching This Summer

Summer 2026 has arrived with a new wave of artificial intelligence (AI) policy from the White House. On June 2, 2026, President Trump signed an Executive Order titled “Promoting Advanced Artificial Intelligence Innovation and Security” (the Order). The Order directs federal agencies—on aggressive 30‑ and 60‑day timelines, with key deliverables due by July 2, 2026 and August 1, 2026—to harden federal information systems with AI‑enabled defenses, establish a voluntary framework for pre‑release federal access to so‑called “covered frontier models,” and prioritize criminal enforcement against malicious AI‑enabled cyber activity. Although the Order is framed as innovation‑and‑security policy and expressly disclaims any “mandatory governmental licensing, preclearance, or permitting requirement” for new AI models, it will have immediate operational consequences for federal information‑technology and cyber contractors, AI developers, critical‑infrastructure operators, and their service providers.

Continue Reading AI Heats Up: New Executive Order on Promoting Advanced Artificial Intelligence Innovation and Security

In a sharply worded order issued May 18, 2026, the Office of Hearings and Appeals (OHA) of the US Small Business Administration (SBA) remanded the agency’s suspension of ATI Government Solutions, LLC, from the 8(a) Business Development (BD) Program, finding the administrative record so deficient that it could not meaningfully review whether the suspension rested on adequate evidence. The case is Matter of ATI Government Solutions, LLC, SBA No. BDPT-728 (2026), and the decision is a forceful reaffirmation of two bedrock principles of administrative law in the 8(a) suspension context: An agency must articulate its reasoning at the time it acts, and the record it submits on appeal must actually contain the materials the decision-maker relied on. It also arrives at a uniquely fraught moment for 8(a) firms—and ATI, a tribally owned participant suspended on the strength of a hidden-camera video, illustrates exactly the kind of fast, thinly supported enforcement action that seems to have become business as usual for the SBA in recent months.

Continue Reading OHA Remands 8(a) Suspension Built on Hidden-Camera Video

Half an inch determined the outcome of a $260 million Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) procurement in Joerns Healthcare, LLC v. United States, a bid protest in which the US Court of Federal Claims (COFC) enforced strict compliance with solicitation specifications. The court rejected the contractor’s reliance on industry standards, holding that unambiguous solicitation terms control evaluation outcomes when agencies verify compliance through stated measurement methods. For contractors competing in FAR Part 12 commercial item acquisitions and FAR Part 15 procurements, the decision reinforces that even minimal deviations from express requirements can render a proposal unacceptable.

Continue Reading Half an Inch from a Quarter-Billion: COFC Tells Contractors to Read the Spec, Not the Industry

A 2026 federal executive order reshapes federal procurement policy by directing agencies to use fixed-price contracts as the default under FAR Part 16, while requiring written justification and higher-level approval for cost-reimbursement, time-and-material, and labor-hour contracts. The order also establishes agency approval thresholds, carve-outs for R&D and contingency work, and a phased implementation schedule through OMB guidance and FAR Council rulemaking. For government contractors, the change affects how agencies structure acquisitions, allocate risk, and modify existing and future contracts, with significant implications for federal procurement strategy and compliance in 2026.

Continue Reading Cost-Plus Out. Fixed-Price In.

Federal contractors looking for the “DEI issue” in FAR 52.222-90 may be looking in the wrong place. Yes, the clause is about what Executive Order 14398 calls “racially discriminatory DEI activities.” But that’s only the starting point. The new clause also reaches subcontract flowdowns, records access, reporting obligations, bilateral modifications, suspension and debarment, and False Claims Act (FCA) risk. This isn’t just an HR issue, and it isn’t just a DEI issue. It is a contract-administration issue, a supply-chain issue, and an invoice issue all at once.

Continue Reading Everything Everywhere All at Once: The Contractor DEI Clause Hits HR, Supply Chains, Invoices, and Subcontracts

On April 7, 2026, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche issued a memorandum establishing the National Fraud Enforcement Division (“NFED”) within the U.S. Department of Justice (“DOJ”). Announced in a corresponding DOJ press release, the NFED is the Department’s first unified litigating division dedicated exclusively to investigating and prosecuting fraud against taxpayer dollars. For the government contractor community, the creation of the NFED represents a meaningful escalation in federal fraud enforcement.

Continue Reading DOJ Stands Up a New Fraud-Fighting Division: What Government Contractors Need to Know About the National Fraud Enforcement Division

A contracting officer issues a solicitation amendment on a Friday afternoon, reverses course by Friday evening and demands a revised quotation by noon on Saturday, then changes the requirements again on both Sunday and Monday with a response window of as little as one hour. The agency’s own suggested solution? Ordering a refrigerator manufactured in Turkey, not available for purchase in the United States. If this sounds like a procurement that went off the rails, the GAO agrees.

Continue Reading When “Reasonable” Means More Than a Weekend: GAO Sustains Protest Over Compressed Response Times

The biggest danger may be misreading the order—and creating new exposure in the process.

On March 26, 2026, President Trump issued an executive order (EO) titled “Addressing DEI Discrimination by Federal Contractors.” Read at the headline level, the order can sound like another broad anti-diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) pronouncement. Read as a procurement directive, however, it is something more concrete and more consequential: a command to federal agencies to begin inserting a mandatory clause into covered contracts and contract-like instruments, including subcontracts and lower-tier subcontracts, within 30 days. That shift, from messaging to mechanics, is the real story.

Continue Reading Beyond the Headlines: The Real Contractor Risks in the New DEI Executive Order

The Administrative False Claims Act of 2023 (AFCA), Pub. L. 118-159, § 5203, enacted December 23, 2024, substantially amended the Program Fraud Civil Remedies Act (PFCRA). On March 19, 2026, the Small Business Administration (SBA) published a direct final rule conforming its regulations to those statutory changes. 91 Fed. Reg. 13217 (Mar. 19, 2026). Absent significant adverse comment, the rule becomes effective May 4, 2026. Together, the AFCA amendments and the conforming rule materially expand SBA’s enforcement reach, raise the jurisdictional threshold for administrative proceedings, extend the statute of limitations, and introduce reverse false claims liability. Contractors doing business with SBA—or whose programs touch SBA loans, grants, or set-aside contracts—should act now.

Continue Reading SBA Expands Administrative False Claims Act Enforcement: What Federal Contractors Need to Know

As we move into spring—a season for tightening processes, clearing the backlog, and getting every detail right—a recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) bid protest decision delivers a timely reminder: in government contracting, a single compliance miss can be outcome determinative.

Last month, in Morrish-Wallace Construction, Inc. d/b/a Ryba Marine Construction Co., the GAO sustained a protest where the agency awarded a contract to a bidder that failed to acknowledge a material solicitation amendment. The decision is an instructive case study in why amendment acknowledgment is not just a box to check—it also is a binding legal act.

Continue Reading Spring Cleaning Your Proposals: GAO’s Latest Reminder That Compliance Is Critical