Weekly Roundup: April 28-May 2, 2025

FY2026 Budget

Trump Proposes $1.01T Defense Budget for FY 2026.  President Donald Trump today unveiled a $1.01 trillion defense budget for fiscal year 2026, fulfilling his long-standing pledge to push military spending past the trillion-dollar mark, and proposing a pay raise for military personnel. The proposal’s heavy reliance on reconciliation funding, however, is drawing pushback from some Republican lawmakers who argue it falls short of the President’s promise. The White House’s FY 2026 budget request calls for a 13 percent increase in defense spending, with $893 billion in discretionary funds and $113 billion in mandatory funding from a Republican-led reconciliation bill – bringing the total request to $1.01 trillion.

Trump Budget Slashes CISA, Science Funding, Boosts Space Mission. The White House’s budget proposal for fiscal 2026 unveiled today is lining up the  Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) for a budget hit totaling $491 million and claiming that the cybersecurity arm of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is too focused on censorship.  

Budget Kickoff: Trump Opens With 7% Cut, Federal Civilian Pay Freeze. President Donald Trump on Friday unveiled his initial budget request for fiscal year (FY) 2026, proposing $163 billion in cuts to non-defense spending – along with a big increase in defense spending – and a pay freeze for Federal civilian employees. Taken together, the budget request for FY2026 proposes a 7.6 percent cut from FY2025 enacted levels.  The FY2026 budget request would mark the first time the budget has not featured a pay increase for Federal civilian employees since 2013. The budget request does, however, include a 3.8 percent pay raise for military service members.

White House Budget Proposes Boost for VA’s EHRM Program. The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is in line for a $5.4 billion funding increase in fiscal year (FY) 2026 under President Donald Trump’s proposed budget published on Friday, including a $2.17 billion increase for the agency’s Electronic Health Record Modernization (EHRM) program.

Technology Modernization Fund

GSA Refocusing TMF Back to Full-Repayment Model. The General Services Administration (GSA) is refocusing the repayment model for awards distributed by the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) toward full repayment by federal agencies from savings they generate from their IT improvement projects. The TMF – which is administered by GSA and run by the TMF Board chaired by Federal CIO Greg Barbaccia –provides money to federal civilian agencies to undertake tech modernization projects. TMF has given more than $1 billion in awards to 34 federal agencies to help jumpstart 69 IT improvement projects. The fund’s original repayment provisions positioned TMF as a revolving fund that would be able to continue making new awards as agencies repaid amounts awarded to them.

Fed IT Experts Call for Enterprise-Wide Approach to Modernization. A panel of Federal government technology experts urged Congress today to support a coordinated, enterprise-wide overhaul of outdated government IT systems and emphasized the critical role of the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) and senior agency leadership support in driving IT modernization progress.

Artificial Intelligence

White House OSTP Wants Input on National AI R&D Strategic Plan. The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) is looking for input on the development of an updated National Artificial Intelligence (AI) Research and Development (R&D) Strategic Plan. In a request for information (RFI) published to the Federal Register on April 29, OSTP asked for input on how a 2023 update to the National AI R&D Strategic Plan could be “rewritten” so that the United States “can secure its position as the unrivaled world leader in artificial intelligence.” OSTP said it aims to do this “by performing R&D to accelerate AI-driven innovation, enhance U.S. economic and national security, promote human flourishing, and maintain the United States’ dominance in AI while focusing on the Federal government’s unique role in AI research and development (R&D) over the next 3 to 5 years.”

Acquisition Transformation

DoD order Army Acquisition Contracts ‘Transformation’. The U.S. Army is about to get a top-down “comprehensive transformation” courtesy of a new memo from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth aimed at reorienting the service to deliver on President Trump’s “peace through strength” agenda. One of the major changes the Army is being tasked with is overhauling its contracting processes, including “adopting performance-based contracts to reduce waste and expanding multi-year procurement agreements when cost-effective.” The Army must also collaborate with the Office of the Secretary of Defense Comptroller to shift from “program-centric to capability-based funding across key portfolios” such as unmanned systems, counter-unmanned ariel systems, and electronic warfare, the Defense secretary ordered.

GSA Unveils ‘OneGov Strategy’ to Modernize Federal IT Buying. The General Services Administration (GSA) has launched a new strategy aimed at modernizing and streamlining Federal IT acquisitions, the agency announced today.  Coined its “OneGov Strategy,” GSA said the initiative will occur in phases. In its first phase, GSA said agencies will be able to access IT tools through standardized terms and pricing, which it claimed will benefit original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) through a “more direct and predictable engagement” model.  “The OneGov Strategy is a bold step forward for President Trump’s GSA and our mission to be responsible stewards of taxpayer dollars,” said GSA Acting Administrator Stephen Ehikian in a statement. Elements of the strategy zero in on improving cybersecurity and employing more transparent pricing through agencies’ direct relationships with OEMs, GSA said, noting that software purchases have generally occurred through resellers. 

Workforce

GSA Promotes Stanton, Shutt to New FAS Roles. The General Services Administration (GSA) has promoted Laura Stanton and Stephanie Shutt to new leadership roles within the agency’s Federal Acquisition Service (FAS). Stanton, who currently serves as the assistant commissioner for the GSA Office of Information Technology Category (ITC), will be the new deputy commissioner of FAS. As for Shutt, a GSA spokesperson confirmed she is serving as the new FAS chief of staff. Shutt has worked at GSA for over 20 years, most recently serving as the director of operation and innovation.

Government Accountability Office

GAO Chief Dishes on Fed AI Data, Tracks DOGE Data Footprint. U.S. Comptroller General Gene Dodaro testified before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch in favor of his agency’s fiscal year 2026 budget request, which seeks a 15 percent top-line increase.  He also delivered a less than glowing review of federal government artificial intelligence (AI) data work where he also said that GAO is undertaking efforts to evaluate the impact of the White House’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) on federal agency systems and data. “We’ve developed a framework for how to audit artificial intelligence algorithms in terms of the data governance structure,” he said, adding that GAO has tripled the number of agency staff working on AI issues. “From our auditing on an ongoing basis across the spectrum of government operations, I can tell you the quality of the data is not good,” he said.

Leadership 

How to Bring Out the Best in Your Team. Frances Frei, professor at Harvard Business School, says that trust, empathy—and even a bit of tough love—are all essential ingredients to strong leadership in today’s world. Successful managers focus on the effect they have on others, not themselves. They also define a strategy and create a culture that drives employee behavior in their absence. Frei is the coauthor, along with Anne Morriss, of the book Unleashed: The Unapologetic Leader’s Guide to Empowering Everyone Around You as well as the HBR article “Begin with Trust.”

In Uncertain Times, Ask These Questions Before You Make a Decision. In today’s perma-crisis world, waiting for stability is like waiting for a train that’s never coming. When everything around you feels unsteady, four questions can serve as strategic tools to help you work through ambiguity, reframe risk, and strengthen your decision-making muscles: 1) What decision today will still make sense a year from now? 2) If a year from now this decision was used as an example of our leadership, what would it teach? 3) What if this isn’t the storm—what if it’s the climate? 4) What’s the cost of waiting? Your answers to these questions will reveal faulty assumptions, spotlight hidden opportunities, and help you focus on what’s within your control.

THIS WEEK @ THE CENTER 

RECENT BLOGS

• Closing:The Path Forward for Collaborative Public Engagement by Julia Carboni. This blog series is designed to equip public leaders and managers with practical tools and strategies for engaging the public in ways that can help restore trust in government. In the first blog post, six aspects of public engagement were introduced. These aspects draw from examples from the William D. Ruckelshaus Center (a collaborative policy and research center that facilitates the resolution of complex public policy challenges in Washington State and beyond) and the author’s two decades of research, training, and practice in public engagement and collaboration.

ICYMI – How to Blend Teaching, Coaching, and Mentoring - a Roadmap to Transforming your Workplace with Dr. Joe Perez.  This week Michael Keegan welcomes Dr. Joe Perez to discuss insights from his book, The Madness Behind the Method: Teaching, Coaching, Mentoring. They explore topics such as how do teaching, coaching, and mentoring differ, how can leaders ensure that mentoring is a two-way street, and what leaders can do to navigate the challenges of digital transformation, especially in areas like data visualization and business intelligence.