The Daily Scoop Podcast

Department of Government Efficiency members stored a copy of a massive Social Security Administration database in a “vulnerable” custom cloud environment, putting more than 300 million people’s personal information at risk, the agency’s chief data officer said in a new whistleblower complaint. The complaint, filed with Congress on Tuesday, revealed new concerns from CDO Charles Borges about “serio...

The Trump White House has tapped Tesla board member and Airbnb cofounder Joe Gebbia to take the lead on its initiative to redesign the federal government’s digital footprint. Gebbia announced that he was appointed as chief design officer in a Saturday post to X, formerly known as Twitter. That role was established by President Donald Trump via executive order last week along with a new National De...

The top lawmakers on a key House cybersecurity panel are hoping to remove a barrier to entry for cyber jobs in the federal government. Introduced last week, the Cybersecurity Hiring Modernization Act from Reps. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., and Shontel Brown, D-Ohio, would prioritize skills-based hiring over educational requirements for cyber jobs at federal agencies. Mace and Brown — the chair and ranking...

President Donald Trump called for improvements to federal government websites in a Thursday executive order, arguing the U.S. government “has lagged behind in usability and aesthetics.” The new directive is focused on both digital and physical spaces and launches an initiative it calls “America by Design” to achieve the administration’s goals. That effort will be led by a new National Design Studi...

As part of its ongoing work with the National Nuclear Security Administration, Anthropic is now working on a new tool designed to help detect when new AI systems output troubling discussions of nuclear weapons. Artificial intelligence systems have the potential to uncover all sorts of new chemical compounds. While many of those discoveries might be promising, and yield, for example, formulas to he...

The China-based artificial intelligence model DeepSeek isn’t available for widespread use at the Department of Energy, but approval of some elements may be possible following a study by two of its national labs, an agency IT official said Tuesday. DeepSeek’s launch has prompted congressional proposals to rein in its use in government and proactive bans by several federal agencies, including DOE. B...

In a sweeping announcement about a forthcoming executive order, President Donald Trump argued Monday that states are ultimately subservient to the White House when it comes to setting election policy. Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social platform that states are “merely an agent for the federal government in counting and tabulating the votes. They must do what the federal government, as repre...

The General Services Administration rolled out a new governmentwide tool Thursday that gives federal agencies the ability to test major artificial intelligence models, a continuation of Trump administration efforts to ramp up government use of automation. The AI evaluation suite, titled USAi.gov, launched Thursday morning and allow federal agencies to test various AI models, including those from A...

Two-time Trump administration vet Lynne Parker has exited as principal deputy director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy following the release of the administration’s AI plan. In a LinkedIn post Tuesday, Parker said she was “passing the torch” and had fulfilled her mission of helping the Trump administration “hit the ground running,” citing the launch of AI innovation and...

Federal agencies will now have access to Anthropic’s Claude model for $1, the General Services Administration announced Tuesday, continuing the agency’s push for artificial intelligence products across government. Under the OneGov deal, all three branches of government will be able to use Anthropic’s Claude for Enterprise and Claude for Government for a nominal $1 fee. Approval for members of Cong...

The Army will be creating a marketplace to better match drones with units based on their requirements. With so many vendors providing a variety of unmanned aerial systems, it can be difficult for formations to determine if certain systems will in fact meet their needs. Col. Danielle Medaglia, project manager for UAS at program executive office for aviation, shared details about the new initiative...

The U.S. judiciary announced plans to increase security for sensitive information on its case management system following what it described as “recent escalated cyberattacks of a sophisticated and persistent nature.” In a Thursday statement, the federal judiciary said it’s “taking additional steps to strengthen protections for” that information. It also said its “further enhancing security of the...

The General Services Administration has been on a roll lately, negotiating what it calls OneGov agreements with some of the federal government’s biggest IT vendors. On Thursday, GSA announced it has negotiated a governmentwide purchasing agreement with Amazon Web Services that could save agencies up to $1 billion through credits for AWS services. The deal is the latest in a flurry of OneGov agreem...

The Senate voted to confirm Sean Cairncross as national cyber director Saturday, giving the Trump administration one of its top cyber officials after a more than five-month process. The vote was 59-35. President Donald Trump nominated Cairncross on Feb. 12. The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee held a hearing on his nomination in early June, then voted to advance him that...

Organizations and leaders representing the interests of statistical professionals and public data access strongly criticized President Donald Trump’s order to fire the leader of the Bureau of Labor Statistics after lower than expected jobs numbers Friday, saying his comments undermine public trust in that information. Their responses came after Trump posted on his social media site Friday afternoo...

The General Services Administration is looking into how it can implement its internal artificial intelligence chatbot across the federal government, the agency’s top AI and data official said Thursday, the latest indication that the Trump administration is planning on streamlining government access to AI. The new initiative marks the “next iteration” of the GSAi platform, Zach Whitman, the agency’...

The digital footprint left by DOGE in agency computer systems and IT networks would be thoroughly examined under legislation introduced Wednesday by a trio of Senate Democrats. The Pick Up After Your DOGE Act from Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts would require the administrator of the Elon Musk-created tech collective to provide a...

There’s a new position in the U.S. government: Federal chief artificial intelligence officer. Gregory Barbaccia has begun to refer to himself as the Federal CAIO, in addition to his current role as the federal government’s chief information officer. A recent interview with CNBC referred to him this way and a federal official focused on AI confirmed to FedScoop that Barbaccia had used that title in...

Democrats on the House Oversight Committee sent a letter to the General Services Administration on Friday demanding more information about how the agency is using Grok, the artificial intelligence chatbot built by Elon Musk’s xAI. The correspondence comes after FedScoop reporting earlier this month revealed that government coders at GSA seemed to be looking at integrating Grok into their artificia...

The likely successor to the late Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., hopes to continue his former boss’s commitment to federal IT reform if elected to Congress, while also gearing up to build his own legacy in the era of DOGE. Democrat James Walkinshaw told FedScoop in an interview last week that carrying on Connolly’s federal IT advocacy is especially important to him as widespread workforce and program...

Since taking office, the Trump administration has made it a top priority to dismantle what it perceives as federal bureaucratic bloat. But it’s the belief of some that those cuts to the federal workforce and federal programs have gone too far, damaging the government’s capacity to meet its mission and serve the American public. Rob Shriver, former acting OPM director during the Biden administratio...

Anduril has scored a nearly $100 million contract to continue experimentation on the Army’s Next Generation Command and Control program, the service said Friday. NGC2, one of the Army’s top priorities, is a clean-slate design for how the service communicates on the battlefield and passes data for operations, providing commanders and units a new approach to information sharing and C2 through agile...

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday to establish a new classification of federal workers in policy-related roles who aren’t career civil servants called “Schedule G.” The schedule appears to create another avenue for political officials in the U.S. government and follows myriad efforts by the Trump administration to reshape the federal workforce, including reductions-in-force...

The Department of Veterans Affairs’ acting chief information officer doubled down on the agency’s reshaping of its IT workforce, telling lawmakers in a Monday hearing that change is “challenging” but “necessary.” Eddie Pool told members of the House VA’s subcommittee on technology modernization that the agency’s Office of Information and Technology (OIT) is pushing forward with workforce reduction...

xAI, the artificial intelligence company led by Elon Musk, announced new efforts Monday to get its generative AI tool, Grok, into the hands of federal government officials. In a post to X, the company announced “Grok for Government,” which it described as a suite of products aimed at U.S. government customers. FedScoop reported on the General Services Administration’s interest in Grok last week. x...