Revolutionary FAR Overhaul: Changes (sort of) to the FAR's Labor Law Provisions
When he issued Executive Order 14275, “Restoring Common Sense to Federal Procurement,” President Trump set in motion the “Revolutionary FAR Overhaul” (RFO) that the administration has called “a historic update to the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR), marking the most significant reform to federal commercial buying procedures in over four decades.” See “The Office of Federal Procurement Policy Launches Landmark Update to FAR, Ushering in a New Era for Commercial Buying,” posted at https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/2025/08/the-office-of-federal-procurement-policy-launches-landmark-update-to-far-ushering-in-a-new-era-for-commercial-buying/ (August 15, 2025, last visited Oct. 29, 2025) (emphasis omitted).
Since then, the White House Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) and the FAR Council have taken out their red pens and blue pencils to re-work but not, as I see it, completely rewrite the FAR. The stated goal is to streamline the acquisition process and to eliminate requirements. While there are potentially significant changes to a number of solicitation and evaluation procedures (e.g., the consolidation of the commercial item and simplified acquisition procedures of FAR parts 12 and 13 as well as some substantive changes to the negotiation rules of FAR Part 15), many of the FAR parts have been hacked up, but not really changed as part of the RFO.
I’ve been on the lookout for what the RFO would do to FAR Part 22 that governs the application of these to government contracts. As it turns out, the overhauled Part 22 (I’ll call it “new 22”) mostly reorganizes, but doesn’t rewrite, the regulations.
The biggest change to new 22 comes as no surprise—FAR subpart 22.8, Equal Opportunity, is deleted in its entirety in accordance with the President’s Executive Order 14173, “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity” that reversed the long-standing equal opportunity requirements that date back to the administration of President Lyndon Johnson (more on that here). The corresponding contract clauses, FAR 52.222-21 through FAR 52.222.29, have been deleted. New 22 also deletes subpart 22.11, Professional Employee Compensation, and its companion contract clause, FAR 52.222-46.
Part 22’s other subparts will remain in the FAR and will bear the same titles. The subparts themselves will be reorganized and consolidated to greater or lesser extents. Color me cynical, but the changes have a distinct “look Daddy I’ve made some changes” quality to them. They don’t really streamline procedures or eliminate requirements—rather, they dump them into a separate bucket or they take short sections that had their own titles and combine them into a single section with one title. Hey—they eliminated requirements didn’t they?!
For example, new 22 will move a number of the current Service Contract Act (SCA) regulations to the nonbinding “FAR Companion” (see brief description below). As noted in the FAR Council’s “Practitioner Album” applicable to new 22:
The following guidance and best practice procedures were moved to the FAR Companion:
* * *
Requirement to obtain wage determinations, (former 22.1007(b) & (c))
Wage determinations based on collective bargaining agreements (former FAR 22.1002-3(b))
Service Contract Labor Standards, Applicability, General (former 22.1003-1)
Administrative limitations, variations, tolerances, and exemptions (former 22.1003-4(a))
Examples of contracts covered by the Service Contract Labor Standards statute (former 22.1003-5)
Repair distinguished from remanufacturing of equipment (former FAR 22.1003-6)
Department of Labor responsibilities and regulations (former FAR 22.1004)
Obtaining wage determinations (former FAR 22-1008-1)
Successorship with incumbent contractor collective bargaining agreement (former FAR 22.1008-2(d)(2))
All possible places of performance not identified (former FAR 22.1009-4(a)(b)
Statement of equivalent rates for Federal hires (former FAR 22.1016(b))
So what is the FAR Companion? The Companion will be part of what is going to be known as the “Strategic Acquisition Guidance” framework. The framework will consist of the FAR, agency FAR supplements, a to-be-issued Category Management Buying Guide, and the Companion Guide. The FAR Council posted the first edition of the FAR Companion on September 9, 2025. Presently, the provisions of Part 22 that are slated for movement to the Companion Guide are in limbo as they were not included in the first edition. Once they are moved, the Companion Guide makes clear that these former regulations are being demoted because the Guide will not be “mandatory compliance guidance” and, further, that it “is not intended to carry legal authority.”
Many of the provisions that weren’t offloaded have been moved and renumbered. For example, we’ve blogged about the quirks of timing new collective bargaining agreements such that contractors will be entitled to a full price adjustment under the SCA Price Adjustment Clause (52.222-43. One of the key provisions was FAR 22.1010; it’s now 22.1004-6 and cross references 22.1003(b)(1) and (2) instead of former 22.1012-2(a) and (b). Needless to say, contracting officers and contractors (and their trusted counsel), will have to root around the FAR and the FAR Companion Guide to find the requirements as they stand going forward.
For now, none of this is truly final even though much of it is being implemented via “class deviations” pending the completion of the usual notice and comment process required to adopt, delete or revise regulations such as the FAR. I fully expect that much confusion, and perhaps disputes, will arise during this transitional period in which existing regulations are not considered existing regulations even though they remain existing regulations.
If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the RFO maelstrom, consider yourself normal. For now, the best advice I can offer to keep abreast of the inventory of changes by monitoring the Revolutionary FAR Overhaul website.See https://www.acquisition.gov/far-overhaul. There you will find links to the current “FAR Companion,” the “Practitioner Albums” that purport to explain the changes being made to each FAR part, as well as links to the overhauled parts and current FAR class deviations that are implementing the changes.