GOP reps now oppose 25% small biz goal

      The last time the House voted in favor of raising the small business procurement goal to 25% it had broad support from both political parties.

      This time was very different: 219 Democrats approved raising the goal in the vote on Sept. 23, while only five Republicans were in support and 202 Republicans voted “no.”

      That is a big turnaround from the previous time, in 2012, when the House increased the goal to 25% in its NDAA bill.

      At that time, Republicans were in the majority in the House, and Rep. Sam Graves, R-MO, chair of the House Small Business Committee, introduced legislation to raise the goal, saying it would increase contract awards for small firms by $10 billion a year. “Small businesses have proven that they can do quality work cheaper and often faster,” Graves said in a statement at the time.

      The bill gained broad bipartisan support and was adopted by the House Armed Services Committee as part of its write-up of the NDAA, which passed the House. But the 25% goal did not become law that year because the Senate did not include it in its NDAA, and the final NDAA dropped the House provision.

      A year later, in 2013, the government met the 23% goal for small business prime procurement for the first time, and it has continued to meet or exceed the goal for the last eight years.

      In the recent NDAA vote, only five GOP lawmakers supported the 25% goal amendment: Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-PA; John Katko, R-NY; Jay Obernolte, R-CA; Tom Reed, R-NY; and Fred Upton, R-MI.

      In House Floor debate on the amendment, Rep. Daniel Meuser, R-PA, asserted that raising small business procurement goals is the wrong approach. He listed several “underlying factors” that must be addressed before raising the goals, including:

• Concerns about the reduction in the number of small federal contractors;
• Concerns about agencies possibly “overreporting” small business goal achievement;
• Concerns that it may be premature to raise the HUBZone goal, which has never been met, or the WOSB goal, which rarely has been met; and
• Concerns that it may be premature to change the WOSB and SDVOSB goals while the SBA is implementing new certifications for those programs.

More Information:
25% goal Amdt. #26 text and the Floor debate at: https://bit.ly/3D98v2N

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