Procurement irregularities
Procurement irregularities include no-bid contracts awarded to political allies or donors, the suspension or manipulation of competitive bidding requirements to favor specific contractors, the directed award of major contracts on thin technical justification, and the structuring of solicitations so that only one bidder qualifies. Lawful emergency procurement, sole-source justifications meeting statutory standards, and routine award decisions explained by neutral evaluation criteria are not irregularities; the abuse is the manipulation of procurement to advantage favored parties.
2026 Events (24)
NOTUS investigation revealed Interior Department pressuring National Park Service to trade Yosemite land to a private developer
NOTUS reported on August 28, 2026, that National Park Service staff, under sustained pressure from U.S. Department of the Interior political leadership, have spent more than a year quietly working to arrange a land exchange inside Yosemite National Park for a company controlled by developer Kingsbarn Realty Capital, which would let Kingsbarn build a private access road into the park from its adjacent 83-acre parcel. Sources familiar with the discussions described the political pressure on Park Service staff as "very unusual," and the Park Service had rejected the same access request from the property's prior owner repeatedly over the preceding two decades. No final decision has been made, and Interior and Kingsbarn both said any exchange would proceed only through the normal legal and environmental review process.
ProPublica investigation reveals Army paid General Dynamics $533 million under no-bid contract for Texas plant that produced zero usable shells
A ProPublica investigation published August 12, 2026 found that the U.S. Army paid General Dynamics $533 million under no-bid "undefinitized contracting action" awards for a Mesquite, Texas artillery-shell plant that never produced a single usable 155mm shell in the roughly two years since it opened in May 2024. Congress had suspended competitive-bidding safeguards for Ukraine-related weapons production in December 2022, and despite the plant's total production failure the Army imposed no penalties, continued making progress payments, and General Dynamics went on to receive $2.5 billion in new contract awards.
Orange County audit found health director dismissed conflict warnings, steered no-bid contracts to allies
An independent forensic audit released August 12, 2026 found that then-Orange County Health Care Agency Director Dr. Clayton Chau repeatedly dismissed internal conflict-of-interest complaints about county subcontracts flowing to a nonprofit where then-Supervisor Andrew Do's daughter worked, and separately hand-selected a friend's pharmacy for a county vaccination contract without competitive bidding. Then-County CEO Frank Kim was also alerted to the conflict but relied on a Do aide's assurances rather than independently verifying it. The audit is the second of four planned phases reviewing roughly $4.3 billion in Orange County contracts from 2019 to 2024.
ICE published notice of plan to buy up to $20M in electric-shock compliance gloves via no-bid contract
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement published a notice on August 10, 2026 for a no-bid contract of up to $20 million to buy electric-shock "G.L.O.V.E." compliance gloves from Compliant Technologies LLC of Lexington, Kentucky, with purchase targeted by March. The notice said the actual solicitation could be published as early as August 14, and the manufacturer warns against using the device on children, pregnant women, elderly or disabled people, or anyone showing only "verbal defiance."
HHS awarded a $150 million sole-source contract to a firm founded by Trump EPA/Interior appointees for migrant children's legal defense
On August 4, 2026, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Refugee Resettlement filed a Federal Register notice announcing intent to award a one-year, $150 million single-source cooperative agreement to Burke Law Group, a 26-employee Houston firm with no immigration-law practice area, to represent roughly 24,000 unaccompanied immigrant children in immigration court. The firm's founder, Marcella Burke, is a former Trump EPA and Interior Department appointee; co-founding partner Jeffrey Hall left the firm in late 2025 after Senate confirmation to lead an EPA enforcement office. The award follows the August 1, 2026 lapse of a longstanding, unpaid contract with a network of roughly 100 nonprofit legal-aid organizations that had represented the children for over two decades.
ICE extended Amentum's no-bid $776M contract to keep Camp East Montana open through 2027
On July 22, 2026, ICE published a notice extending without competitive bidding the contract of Amentum Services Inc. to keep operating Camp East Montana, the nation's largest immigration detention facility at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, through September 30, 2027, at a potential added cost of $776 million; the Associated Press first reported the extension on July 27, 2026. The extension came despite a July 15, 2026 Human Rights Watch/ACLU report documenting beatings, medical neglect, and at least one death in custody at the facility, and calls from congressional Democrats and advocacy groups to close it.
Executive Office of the President awarded a no-bid contract to Parscale's Campaign Nucleus for Freedom 250 sites that collected visitors' data
The Freedom 250 websites — including the government-redirect domain 250.gov and the event-registration platform events.freedom250.org — were built and operated by the Executive Office of the President's National Design Studio and by Campaign Nucleus, a firm founded by former Trump campaign digital director Brad Parscale. The sites tracked visitors' precise geolocation and logged form-entered personal information through an analytics script that was quietly removed in mid-June 2026 after The Guardian sought comment, while Campaign Nucleus separately collected registrants' names, ZIP codes, and mobile numbers and scores individuals for voter-targeting purposes. On July 1, 2026, the Executive Office of the President awarded Campaign Nucleus a non-competitive $66,000 blanket purchase agreement, running through 2031 and described only as "EVENT PLANNING."
Washington Post investigation revealed Trump awarded $500M no-bid White House ballroom contract, bypassing competitive bidding
A Washington Post investigation published June 30, 2026 revealed that the Trump White House awarded a no-bid contract worth up to $500 million to Clark Construction for a new East Wing ballroom, routing the deal through the Executive Residence — a White House entity exempt from federal competitive bidding requirements. Trump personally selected the contractor and negotiated project costs, including a $2.3 million reduction in concrete pricing. White House Office of Administration Director Joshua Fisher justified bypassing competitive bids by claiming that disclosing the project's procurement needs would "compromise the national security."
Washington Post report reveals ICE revised detention standards at Geo Group's private request, exempting detainees from minimum-wage protections
On June 16, 2026, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement issued new national detention standards that, according to Washington Post reporting, incorporated language privately requested by Geo Group, the country's largest private immigration detention contractor. Geo Group had asked ICE to remove contractor obligations to comply with state and local detainee-treatment laws and to add language supporting its legal position that paying detainees $1 per day does not violate minimum-wage laws because detainees are not employees. The newly published standards include both categories of change: they explicitly state that detainees are not employees and are not entitled to wages or benefits under applicable wage or labor laws.
GAO finds ICE wasted up to $11.5M and endangered detainees in rushed Camp East Montana launch
On June 9, 2026, the U.S. Government Accountability Office released a report (GAO-26-108886) finding that ICE rushed the opening of Camp East Montana, the nation's largest immigration detention facility and a tent camp at the Army's Fort Bliss base in El Paso, wasting up to $11.5 million during its first two weeks in August 2025 while the camp sat empty. The watchdog found ICE awarded a roughly $1.3 billion operating contract to Acquisition Logistics LLC, a firm with no detention experience, and documented unsafe conditions including a contract guard's loss of a loaded firearm that was never recovered and the contractor's failure to provide required use-of-force and death reports. ICE terminated the Acquisition Logistics contract in March after three detainee deaths, a measles outbreak, and mounting human-rights allegations.
Criminal charges revealed former Tulsa Public Schools bond director Hudgins directed a decade-long kickback scheme benefiting his own company
Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond and Tulsa County District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler charged former Tulsa Public Schools Executive Director of Bonds and Energy Management Charles Christopher Hudgins, along with contractors Thomas McKenna and Gayle Gwinup of Allied Engineering Group, on June 4, 2026 with conspiracy, embezzlement and kickback violations. Prosecutors alleged Hudgins directed the district to pay Allied Engineering more than $779,000 for roofing projects never performed, with Allied Engineering funneling most of that money to Hudgins' own architecture firm. A state audit released August 18, 2026 found the full scheme, which ran from 2015 to 2025, diverted $3.73 million in misspent bond and rebate funds, including more than $2.6 million paid directly to Hudgins' business.
DHS awards $25M no-bid contract to BI2 for 1,500+ iris scanners to identify immigrants
On May 22, 2026, the Department of Homeland Security awarded BI2 Technologies a $25.1 million no-bid contract for more than 1,500 iris-scanning devices and continuous access to BI2's biometric database of more than five million booking records — roughly five times the value and nearly eight times the device count of DHS's prior September 2025 contract with the Massachusetts firm. The procurement did not require the system to clear FedRAMP, the federal cloud-security review for systems handling sensitive data, and the award documents described no independent audit, no congressional notification, and no outside review of how scans would be retained, shared, or matched. ICE plans to deploy the devices to Enforcement and Removal Operations agents for field use by late June.
Florida Legislature, FDLE steered $6M budget earmark and $16M in grants to Peregrine Technologies without competitive bidding
On May 15, 2026, the Florida House Justice Budget Conference Committee inserted a $6 million appropriation for a law-enforcement data-integration platform into state budget negotiations, wording that mirrored FDLE's own January 2026 budget request naming Peregrine Technologies directly. Peregrine's head of business development, Matthew Melton, is married to Rep. Fiona McFarland, a member of the conference committee that added the funding, and the company's lobbying firm donated $225,000 to Republican leadership PACs in the months before. FDLE's State Board of Immigration Enforcement separately granted more than $16 million from a $250 million immigration-enforcement trust fund to over two dozen local agencies earmarked to buy the same Peregrine software.
DHS Inspector General opens audit of ICE warehouse-detention buys made about 13% above market value across multiple states
On May 14, 2026, the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General announced an audit of whether U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement acquired warehouse properties — being converted into detention facilities under a multibillion-dollar program launched by then-Secretary Kristi Noem and adviser Corey Lewandowski — "in a cost-effective manner." Real-estate data tracker CoStar found DHS paid an average of about 13% above market value for warehouses across multiple states; aggregate spending on the warehouse program has been reported at about $1 billion across eight states. The OIG also opened a separate investigation of Mr. Lewandowski's role as a special government employee.
Interior Secretary Burgum unveils a Tom Fazio redesign of D.C.'s East Potomac Golf Links
On May 14, 2026, U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum publicly unveiled, via his official @SecretaryBurgum account, a Tom Fazio design for the federally led renovation of East Potomac Golf Links, a century-old District of Columbia municipal course. Fazio Golf Design is the firm of architect Tom Fazio, who designed President Donald Trump's Trump National Golf Club Bedminster and has worked on multiple other Trump courses; Trump and Burgum will jointly oversee the East Potomac redesign. The arrangement follows the December 2025 termination by the Trump administration of the National Links Trust's 50-year lease covering East Potomac, Langston, and Rock Creek and a May 2026 National Park Service deal placing the East Potomac renovation under an NPS-led group of public and private partners rather than the NLT.
U.S. Air Force agreed to buy interceptor drones from Powerus, a startup backed by Trump's sons
On April 30, 2026, Bloomberg reported that the U.S. Air Force agreed to buy an undisclosed number of interceptor drones from Powerus, a West Palm Beach-based drone startup backed by Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. through their Aureus Greenway Holdings investment vehicle. The deal extended the Pentagon's contracting ties to companies linked to the Trump family at a moment when Democratic lawmakers had already warned the Defense Department had no protocols to prevent conflicts of interest with the president's sons. Sen. Elizabeth Warren had formally pressed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for answers on the issue in January and March 2026, receiving responses that failed to address potential favoritism.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection awarded Barnard Construction a $1.6 billion no-bid border-wall contract citing urgency
On April 24, 2026, U.S. Customs and Border Protection awarded Barnard Construction Company — a Montana firm chaired by Trump donor Tim Barnard — a $1.6 billion contract to build roughly 112.5 miles of secondary border wall in the El Paso Sector, without competitive bidding. Federal records list "urgency" as the justification for bypassing competition and show that cost and pricing data were waived. The award was part of a broader pattern in which CBP steered most new Texas and New Mexico wall contract value to two of eleven pre-approved vendors.
Park Service extends White House AECOM contract to bypass bidding on Trump's Triumphal Arch
On April 22, 2026, National Park Service acting director Jessica Bowron asked the White House whether NPS could extend an existing AECOM Services contract for White House grounds engineering to cover environmental-assessment work for President Trump's proposed 250-foot Triumphal Arch — a site on Park Service land across the Potomac River, more than a mile from the White House complex. Heather Martin, an Executive Office of the President official, approved the request within an hour. Internal emails obtained by The Washington Post and published May 14, 2026 show the arrangement would bypass federal competitive-bidding requirements; the Park Service estimated the arch work at $600,000, and contracting experts said the administration's Economy Act citation stretches a statute meant for agencies that lack procurement capability.
National Park Service gave Trump donor's firm a second no-bid contract months after its Tijuana River pilot failed
On April 3, 2026, the National Park Service awarded Greenwater Services — a water-treatment company owned through a trust led by Trump donor John J. Cafaro — a $1.7 million no-bid contract to install an ozone "nanobubble" filtration system at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, citing the same urgency exemption it used the same day to award a separate no-bid contract to Atlantic Industrial Coatings. It was Greenwater's second no-bid federal contract: about a year earlier, the U.S. International Boundary and Water Commission had hired the company to pilot the same technology in the sewage-contaminated Tijuana River, a project independent scientists and a longtime river-restoration official say failed and worsened conditions, despite the company's and government's public claims of success.
National Park Service awards $6.9M no-bid Reflecting Pool contract to a Trump-chosen firm
On April 3, 2026, the National Park Service awarded a $6.9 million no-bid contract to Atlantic Industrial Coatings — a Virginia firm that had never previously held a federal contract — to resurface the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and paint its basin blue. President Donald Trump said he personally selected the firm, citing its work on his private swimming pools, and the administration invoked a competitive-bidding exemption reserved for urgent situations without claiming the injury that exemption requires, citing instead Trump's wish to finish before the July 4 celebration of the nation's 250th anniversary. Government documents reported by The New York Times indicate the cost has already more than tripled the roughly $2 million Trump publicly promised and could exceed $12 million.
NBC News investigation revealed Corey Lewandowski solicited kickback payments from DHS contractors GEO Group and Salus
NBC News published an investigation on March 19, 2026 reporting that Corey Lewandowski, a Department of Homeland Security special government employee functioning as de facto chief of staff to Secretary Kristi Noem, solicited payments from DHS contractors GEO Group and Salus Worldwide Solutions in exchange for protecting or securing their contracts. GEO Group's founder declined the demand, while representatives connected to Salus were told a Lewandowski-tied "consultant" needed to be hired to secure contracts worth up to $50 million. Congressional Democrats opened multiple investigations following the report, and Lewandowski denied the allegations through a spokesperson.
Trump administration steered no-bid federal contracts worth up to $118M to Jan. 6 rally planner's firm Event Strategies
A March 18, 2026 New York Times report, later detailed in a July 2, 2026 House Natural Resources Committee Democratic staff oversight report, found that Event Strategies Inc.—an events firm formerly led by January 6 rally planner Justin Caporale—received an indefinite-delivery federal master contract worth up to $100 million plus more than $18 million in State Department contracts tied to the America250/Freedom250 anniversary events, all awarded outside competitive bidding. The State Department contracts, described blandly as "event planning" and "event support," listed the U.S. Chief of Protocol's office under Ambassador Monica Crowley as the funding office. Since the start of 2025 the firm had received 18 federal contracts connected to the semiquincentennial.
Coast Guard sole-sourced $957 million Arctic icebreaker contract to Davie Defense without competitive bidding
On February 10, 2026, the U.S. Coast Guard awarded a sole-source, single-offer contract worth $957 million to Davie Defense Inc. for five Arctic Security Cutters, citing a public-interest exception rather than competing the work. The award completed an 11-ship, roughly $3.3 billion program that followed President Trump's personal push for a larger icebreaker fleet than the Coast Guard had itself requested; the program's first two contracts, awarded to Bollinger Shipyards and Rauma Marine Constructions on December 26, 2025, are recorded separately.
National Park Service awarded ballroom contractor Clark Construction a no-bid $17.4M Lafayette Park fountain contract
In January 2026, the National Park Service awarded Clark Construction Group — the contractor also building President Trump's East Wing White House ballroom — a sole-source, no-bid contract to repair two Lafayette Park fountains, invoking an urgency exemption normally reserved for emergencies. The award grew from a 2022 government estimate of $3.3 million to $17.4 million, with contracting specialists identifying irregularities including double-counted inflation costs.
2025 Events (5)
Coast Guard sole-sourced $2.39 billion in Arctic icebreaker contracts to Bollinger and Rauma without competitive bidding
On December 26, 2025, the U.S. Coast Guard awarded sole-source, single-offer contracts worth a combined $2.39 billion to Bollinger Shipyards and Rauma Marine Constructions for six Arctic Security Cutters, citing a public-interest exception rather than competing the work. The awards were the first two of an 11-ship, roughly $3.3 billion program that followed President Trump's personal push for a larger icebreaker fleet than the Coast Guard had itself requested; the program's third contract, awarded to Davie Defense on February 10, 2026, is recorded separately.
White House steered a record $620M Pentagon loan to a rare-earth firm tied to Donald Trump Jr.
White House senior counselor Peter Navarro personally asked the Pentagon's Office of Strategic Capital to approve a $620 million loan to Vulcan Elements, a North Carolina rare-earth-magnet startup — the only one of dozens of companies under consideration whose deal was initiated by a top White House aide. Donald Trump Jr.'s venture-capital firm had taken an undisclosed stake in Vulcan about three months before the deal was announced, and the company's valuation rose roughly tenfold afterward. The White House role was revealed by a ProPublica investigation published May 28, 2026.
Coast Guard awards $172M no-bid contract for two Gulfstream G700 jets for DHS Secretary Noem and leadership
On October 17, 2025, the U.S. Coast Guard approved a $172 million no-bid contract — with a total estimated cost of $200 million — to purchase two Gulfstream G700 private jets for use by DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and other DHS leadership, even as a government shutdown had halted other federal services. DHS had previously sought funding for a single aircraft at a projected cost of $50 million; the no-bid contract for two jets at four times that estimate drew immediate criticism from House Appropriations Democrats, who alleged the purchase was made to benefit Noem personally.
DHS awarded $220M in no-bid advertising contracts under Noem, funneling work to firms tied to her inner circle
On February 13, 2025, DHS awarded a $143 million no-bid contract to Safe America Media LLC — a Delaware shell company incorporated just seven days earlier — as part of a $220 million advertising campaign to promote the agency's immigration enforcement mission and featuring Secretary Kristi Noem prominently. DHS bypassed competitive bidding by invoking a border "national emergency." A second $77 million no-bid contract went to People Who Think LLC. Work under the Safe America Media contract was secretly subcontracted to the Strategy Group, an Ohio Republican consulting firm run by the husband of Noem's DHS chief spokesperson. Noem separately implemented a policy requiring her personal sign-off on all DHS grants and contracts exceeding $100,000, causing agency-wide funding bottlenecks.
Ken Paxton's office diverted state-funded inauguration hotel rooms to major donors, leaving two stays billed to taxpayers
In January 2025, the Texas Office of the Attorney General booked a nonrefundable block of ten hotel rooms costing over $20,000 in state funds for staff attending Trump's inauguration and related Supreme Court arguments in Washington, D.C. When a winter storm kept several employees from traveling, unused rooms were informally reassigned to Paxton donors and allies — including major donors Terry and Jennifer Lacore, Albanian businessman Bashkim Ulaj, and Albanian Republican Party chair Fatmir Mediu — without following proper transfer procedures. At least two guests had their stays billed to the state without payment, and the agency ultimately paid $8,339 for rooms that served private individuals with documented financial or political ties to Paxton.
2024 Events (1)
Montana Senate President Jason Ellsworth steered no-bid state contract to close associate
In the final days of December 2024, Montana Senate President Jason Ellsworth (R-Hamilton) signed a $170,100 no-bid contract for legislative bill-tracking services with Agile Analytics, a company owned by his longtime friend and former business partner Bryce Eggleston, splitting the payment into two invoices to evade the state's competitive-bidding threshold. A Montana Legislative Auditor investigation concluded the arrangement "constitute[d] an abuse of his government position."