With the passage of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008 (the “2008 Act”), Congress expanded the GAO’s jurisdiction to include bid protests in connection with civilian and defense contract task and delivery orders valued at over $10 million. See Section 843 of the 2008 Act, Pub. L. No. 110-181. Congress also included a sunset provision in the 2008 Act that limited that grant of expanded jurisdiction to 3 years – i.e., until May 27, 2011. See id. We previously discussed Section 843 of the 2008 Act and its implications...(see full article for links).

With the expiration date in sight, Congress sought to extend the GAO’s expanded jurisdiction until September 30, 2016. See Section 825 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2011 (the “2011 Act”).

Or so we thought. Section 825 of the 2011 Act only references 10 U.S.C. § 2304c(e), which relates to Department of Defense (“DoD”) contracts. There is no mention of Title 41, which applies to civilian contracts, as there had been in the 2008 Act. See H.R. 6523, Section 825; see also S. 3454, Section 833. As a result, Section 825 of the 2011 Act extends the GAO’s jurisdiction over task and delivery orders in excess of $10 million until September 30, 2016 only for DoD contract task and delivery orders. The GAO’s expanded jurisdiction over civilian contract task and delivery orders apparently will sunset on May 27, 2011.

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