CONSOLIDATING PROCUREMENT: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order consolidating federal procurement for common goods and services in the General Services Administration (GSA)—the agency designed to conduct procurement—which will eliminate waste, inefficiencies, and duplication and enable agencies to focus on their core mission of delivering excellent services to the American people.
- Since January 20th, 2025, GSA has coordinated the termination or economization of over 6,000 contracts across the federal government. This Executive Order expands upon those efforts by directing:
- Agency Heads to submit proposals to GSA for consolidating domestic procurement functions for common goods and services within GSA, the agency with expertise in such procurement.
- GSA and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to develop a comprehensive plan for consolidating common goods and services procurement across the government to eliminate waste and duplication, while delivering the best possible services to the American people.
- Agencies to designate GSA as the executive agent for the administration of government-wide acquisition contracts.
RESTORING COMMON SENSE TO ACQUISITION: President Trump believes that a streamlined, centralized approach to procurement is essential to ensuring taxpayer dollars are spent wisely and efficiently.
- The government spends about $490 billion per year on federal contracts for common goods and services, making it the largest buyer of goods and services in the world.
- For too long, agencies have independently purchased office productivity software, leading to numerous challenges and inefficiencies, including pricing inconsistencies.
- For example, the cost of a comprehensive suite of Microsoft Office 365 services could vary between agencies by more than $200 per license.
- Consolidating the acquisition of this software in GSA could result in more than $100M in savings per year.
- Agencies buy a wide range of common goods like band saw blades and televisions, which could be centralized in GSA and result in major savings for the American taxpayer.
- For a 32-7/8″ band saw blade, GSA’s average purchase price is 22% lower than that available through other government procurement vehicles and on the commercial market.
- For a 50-inch flat screen TV, GSA’s average purchase price is 20% lower than that available through other government procurement vehicles, and almost 30% lower than commercial market pricing.
- The federal government routinely handles sensitive information and buys identity protection services to prevent and respond to data breaches—however, these are purchased in a decentralized manner, leading to inconsistent pricing and underutilization of volume-based discounts.
- GSA has an established purchasing solution that channels government-wide demand and saved $150 million in FY 24 alone.
- Every government agency needs to purchase computers for their employees to effectively serve the American people, totaling well over $1 billion annually.
- Over the last 10 years, almost $6 billion has gone through GSA, which realizes an average savings rate of 38%.
- While NASA, NIH, Army, and GSA have set up a program to establish minimum computer standards and leverage the volume of government purchasing to achieve savings, not every agency has taken advantage of the program to reduce their costs.
- Centralizing and standardizing procurement will make purchasing as simple and efficient as possible.
- Using the aforementioned savings examples as a proxy, a 10% reduction in spending through this consolidation initiative could result in approximately $50 billion in savings to the taxpayers per year.
ELIMINATING WASTE: Since Day One, President Trump has been laser focused on eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal government.
- This Executive Order builds on his administration’s broader commitment to fiscal responsibility, cutting unnecessary bureaucratic bloat and redirecting resources to priorities that directly benefit the American people.
- President Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has already identified more than $100 billion in estimated savings from a “combination of asset sales, contract/lease cancellations and renegotiations, fraud and improper payment deletion, grant cancellations, interest savings, programmatic changes, regulatory savings, and workforce reductions.”