The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee advanced a bill May 25 that aims to address potential conflicts of interest within the Federal contracting community. An amended version of the bill was reported favorably out of committee and heads to the full Senate for possible consideration. […]

The Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee on May 25 approved a bill that would direct the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) to develop a national strategy for the research and development (R&D) of distributed ledger technologies. […]

The House Committee on Financial Services on May 17 voted to approve an amended version of H.R.7022 – the Strengthening Cybersecurity for the Financial Sector Act of 2022 – and send the bill to the full House of Representatives for consideration. […]

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Army
broadband

New legislation introduced by Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Gary Peters, D-Mich., and Sen. Mike Braun, R-Ind., aims to tighten up oversight of Federal agency performance goals, and publish more public data to help track how agencies are performing against stated goals. […]

semiconductor

Sen. Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo., said during an Axios virtual event today that she is confident her bipartisan cryptocurrency legislation with Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., will allow members of Congress to find “common ground” and a better understanding of digital assets. […]

A bipartisan bill introduced in the House this week aims to increase oversight and regulatory clarity of the growing cryptocurrency market, and provide the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) with oversight authority of the market. […]

semiconductor

House and Senate negotiators are slated to begin their formal conferencing process this week to hammer out a final version of legislation that would deliver billions of Federal funding to innovation-directed programs and jump-start United States semiconductor production, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said April 25. […]

New legislation filed by Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif., on April 20 would create additional legal protections for metadata generated by customers of online service providers and stored in cloud-based systems, in addition to the content of the electronic communications that they generate. […]

taxes, IRS

As the IRS faces a backlog of about 23.5 million tax returns and pieces of correspondence stretching back to the 2020 tax season, members of the House Oversight and Reform Committee called on the agency Thursday to modernize its IT systems and invest in scanning technology to improve efficiency. […]

USPS Postal Service

Leaders of the House Oversight and Reform Committee are launching an investigation into identity verification contractor ID.me, citing concerns about the efficacy, security, and privacy of its facial recognition technology that is used by millions of Americans seeking access to government services. […]

A new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO), found that water surveillance technology has allowed public health officials to detect community-level disease outbreaks and even identify COVID-19 outbreaks one to two weeks sooner than clinical testing. However, GAO found a lack of national coordination and standardized methods leads to challenges with wider adoption of the tech. […]

EHR

Rep. Matt Rosendale, R-Mont., wrote a letter to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) urging it to address an issue with its Electronic Health Record Modernization (EHRM) program that requires a double-entry process for pharmacists to prescribe medication to veterans. […]

semiconductor

Shortly before heading out of town for a two-week home-district work period, Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress named a whopping 87 members to a conference committee that will work out differences between the House and Senate versions of a competition and innovation bill that includes $52 billion in semiconductor funding, funding for a new tech directorate at the National Science Foundation, and big boosts in Federal research and development funding. […]

military healthcare, veterans healthcare

The House Oversight and Reform Committee on April 6 voted to approve the Access for Veterans to Records Act that aims to cut down the backlog of veterans’ records requests at the National Personnel Records Center, which is housed in the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). […]

Critical infrastructure

The House voted on April 5 to approve legislation that would require the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to revamp and improve their memorandum of understanding (MOU) on spectrum coordination. […]

military healthcare, veterans healthcare

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee approved several legislative measures during a mark-up session on March 30 that would kickstart satellite sector cybersecurity efforts, aim to boost Federal agency healthcare security, and improve government contracting processes. […]

Senate hearing Congressional-min

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee approved legislation on March 30 that would jumpstart IT modernization efforts for Federal agencies – but at the same time rejected an amendment to the bill that would help pay for that effort. […]

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Two key Biden administration nominations to the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA) failed to win approval today from the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, as the committee deadlocked with 7-7 votes on both nominations. […]

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