The Daily Scoop Podcast

The Daily Scoop Podcast
  • 4.8 (16)
  • News
  • Updated Daily

A podcast covering the latest news & trends facing top government leaders on topics such as technology, management & workforce. Hosted by Billy Mitchell on FedScoop and released Monday-Friday.

  1. Oracle wins OPM’s massive governmentwide HR modernization contract

    1d ago

    Oracle wins OPM’s massive governmentwide HR modernization contract

    The Office of Personnel Management on Wednesday awarded its anticipated contract to modernize and consolidate federal human resources functions to Oracle, capping a process that’s been over a year in the making. The nearly $400 million award puts Oracle in charge of a process to bring over 100 HR systems under one single platform that the agency is calling its Core Human Capital Management system. OPM says it believes the project will make significant reductions in the overall cost of HR platforms to taxpayers. “Historically, federal agencies have relied on fragmented, aging HR systems that are costly to maintain and difficult to scale,” OPM Director Scott Kupor said in a written statement included in a press release. He called the award “a foundational investment in the future of federal workforce management.” A final award comes over a year after an early effort to award such a contract failed to move forward. In May 2025, the Office of Personnel Management awarded a sole-source contract to Workday to facilitate the Trump administration’s HR modernization efforts, arguing it was the only vendor that could do the job. But OPM abruptly canceled that award, and later launched open competition for such a contract. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency on Wednesday ordered federal agencies to prioritize vulnerabilities based on four criteria, as part of a push to “patch smarter, not harder.” Federal agencies should emphasize patches for vulnerabilities that affect a publicly exposed asset, allow an attacker to fully automate exploitation, give attackers the ability to take over control of a system or relate to evidence of active, real-world exploitation, CISA declared. CISA acting director Nick Andersen previewed the binding operational directive (BOD) Tuesday, framing it as a rethinking of vulnerability management more broadly. Andersen said in a statement: “This Directive provides clear definitions, timelines and criteria that enhances transparency, predictability and agencies’ resource planning to execute more effective vulnerability remediation." BOD 26-04 sets forth timelines for how quickly agencies must fix a vulnerability based on how many of the four criteria it meets. If it meets all four, for example, agencies need to fix it within three days and carry out a “forensic triage” to assess whether their systems were compromised. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.

    5 min
  2. CBP is installing new AI-powered surveillance towers at the southern border

    2d ago

    CBP is installing new AI-powered surveillance towers at the southern border

    U.S. Customs and Border Protection is moving forward on AI-powered autonomous surveillance towers that are expected to be deployed across the southern border, signing a $71 million task order with GDIT last week. The award is the latest in a massive indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity contract, worth up to $1.8 billion, that kicked off three years ago and is aimed at modernizing and expanding CBP’s surveillance tower system. GDIT is a key player in CBP’s modernization plans as the prime contractor on a remote video surveillance program, the developer of a CBP database with quantum sensors and a fundamental part of a number of other projects including the smart border wall. Michael Wagner, VP of biometrics, border and transportation security at GDIT, told FedScoop that the company started working on this next-generation autonomous tower about three years ago and has gone through several iterations of solutioning and testing and validating out in the field. The American military deployed an autonomous Corsair maritime drone built by Saronic to find and recover two soldiers who were stranded near the Strait of Hormuz on Monday after their Army AH-64 Apache helicopter crashed during a patrol operation, U.S. Central Command spokesperson Capt. Tim Hawkins told DefenseScoop. The confirmation of this unique rescue mission comes as military tensions are surging in the Middle East amid the United States-Iran conflict. It marks the U.S. military’s first publicized use of an autonomous surface vessel to locate and retrieve downed aircrew in real-world warfare, following years of experimentation with different types of sea drones. Hawkins said the drone used in the operation was a U.S. Navy Corsair unmanned surface vessel operated by U.S. 5th Fleet’s Task Force 59. In that rescue operation, he told DefenseScoop, the maritime drone picked the two pilots up “and transported them to another location on the water where they were then hoisted up to a helicopter for further transport.” The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.

    6 min
  3. OPM announces new Tech Force partners

    3d ago

    OPM announces new Tech Force partners

    The federal government’s human capital arm added several new industry partners to its Tech Force hiring effort Monday as the program begins to take root in agencies. The new batch of companies is Cisco, Scale AI, Wiz, Arista Networks, Armada, Cognition AI, Cognizant, Payward, and Moveworks, per a release from the Office of Personnel Management. They join a cohort of a couple dozen companies that are already part of the program’s industry support, including OpenAI, Google Public Sector, xAI, and Palantir. “These partnerships bring world-class engineering expertise into public service and create a stronger pipeline between industry and government at a moment when modernizing federal technology has never been more important,” OPM Director Scott Kupor said in a written statement Monday. According to the release, the companies will provide training resources and programming, as well as their own employees who they’ll nominate for temporary federal service. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.

    6 min
  4. Trump issues a new AI national security memo

    4d ago

    Trump issues a new AI national security memo

    President Donald Trump on Friday signed out a new artificial intelligence national security memorandum that the White House says establishes “a new framework to put the most advanced, secure, and reliable AI systems into the hands of America’s warfighters and intelligence professionals while ensuring their responsible use.” The memo rescinds the Biden administration’s National Security Memorandum-25 from October 2024 that similarly set governance for the use and safety of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in national security and intelligence systems. The new guidance sets policies driving four key actions around AI in the national security space. The Department of the Air Force has tapped Ashley Devoto — a veteran and cybersecurity expert — as its new chief information officer, the department announced Thursday. Devoto enters the role after the department has been without a permanent CIO for over a year following the departure of Venice Goodwine in March 2025. With a decades-long career in cybersecurity fields, Devoto will now oversee the Air and Space Forces’ modernization and sustainment efforts for information technology and more. As CIO, she will lead the department’s enterprise information technology, data and artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and defense business systems portfolios and steward approximately $17 billion in technology investments that enable the missions of more than 800,000 Airmen, Guardians, civilians, and contractors worldwide. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.

    5 min
  5. The CIA wants to turbocharge commercial tech buying with a new acquisition framework

    Jun 3

    The CIA wants to turbocharge commercial tech buying with a new acquisition framework

    Earlier this year, the CIA issued a new acquisition framework that it hopes will “turbocharge” collaboration with industry by proritizing the adoption of commercial products. Along with the framework, the agency released new processes for centralized vendor vetting and streamlined IT authorization. In her first interview as the CIA’s chief procurement officer, Effie Frangogiannis joins the Daily Scoop to break down the new framework, how interested industry partners can get involved and what’s coming next. The Trump administration issued a revised executive order Tuesday focused on artificial intelligence, offering a significantly pared-back vision for the federal government’s role vetting AI systems compared with a draft version that was spiked weeks ago. The order keeps in place the administration’s largely voluntary framework for companies to engage with the federal government around testing new models before release, but appears to considerably weaken or loosen provisions that had been opposed by industry. Under the order, AI companies would voluntarily provide the federal government access to frontier models before release, but now it will be for “up to” 30 days instead of the 90-day timeline included in previous drafts. It also explicitly states that nothing in the program will be construed as mandatory or part of a federal licensing or permitting regime, and gives AI companies significant influence to help define what models would and would not be covered under for testing. Under the order, all federal testing and access to the models would be subject to “confidentiality, cybersecurity, insider-risk, and intellectual-property protection, use, and nondisclosure requirements.” The Pentagon’s next iteration of the Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability (JWCC) contract would establish a cloud marketplace for military users while expanding support for artificial intelligence, edge computing and cross-domain operations, according to a draft solicitation. On May 20, the Defense Information Systems Agency published a draft performance of work statement for the upcoming JWCC Unified Cloud Marketplace (UCM) contract on Sam.gov. Previously known as JWCC Next, the program is intended to create a single marketplace through which Defense Department organizations can access authorized cloud services from a broad range of vendors. Under the proposed structure, the UCM would be organized into three tiers. The first would consist of hyperscale cloud service providers delivering core infrastructure and platform services. A second tier would encompass “Everything-as-a-Service” (XaaS) offerings — including software-, platform- and infrastructure-as-a-service capabilities. A third tier would be dedicated to commercial innovators and small businesses offering cloud-based technologies that meet the department’s security requirements. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.

    27 min
  6. A federal AI consortium reemerges with a new name, scope and call for members

    Jun 1

    A federal AI consortium reemerges with a new name, scope and call for members

    The National Institute of Standards and Technology’s AI Safety Consortium will now be called the NIST Artificial Intelligence Consortium, the agency said Friday, continuing a shift in approach to the technology under President Donald Trump. According to NIST’s announcement, the renamed group will retain some of its previous work but will change its scope. The group is also seeking new member organizations to carry out its aims. Craig Burkhardt, deputy NIST director, said in a statement included in the release. “To encourage more extraordinary AI technological innovations, NIST is seeking to expand its AI measurement efforts by harnessing the broader community’s interests and capabilities.” The decision comes about a year after the Trump administration changed the name of NIST’s AI Safety Institute, pivoting away from “safety.” That organization, which was originally established under the Biden administration, is now called the Center for AI Standards and Innovation. It’s also the first news about the consortium in some time. The consortium was established in 2024 alongside the AI Safety Institute as a venue for input from companies, universities, and other organizations on measurement standards for AI safety. NIST is in the headlines once more this week, but not for reasons it’s going to be excited about. Department of Commerce inspector general report released Thursday found that the National Institute of Standards and Technology has mismanaged a critical cybersecurity vulnerability database through poor planning, inefficient operations, duplicate federal programs, and failure to communicate with users. The National Vulnerability Database, maintained by NIST since 2005, collects information about computer security flaws and adds details like severity ratings and affected products. This information helps cybersecurity professionals across government and the private sector decide which security problems to fix first. In February 2024, the database’s enrichment contract lapsed, creating a backlog of unprocessed security flaws that has only grown worse. The report identified the lack of strategic planning as a core problem. NIST leaders admitted they had no long-term plan for clearing the backlog, even as it grew from about 13,000 unprocessed security flaws in June 2024 to over 27,000 by the end of 2025. NIST publicly promised in May 2024 that it would clear the backlog by September 2024, setting a goal of processing 6,200 security flaws per month, but the agency had never processed more than 5,000 per month in the past. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.

    6 min
  7. DOD looks to move beyond ‘fragmented’ CJADC2 deployments with $2B budget request

    May 29

    DOD looks to move beyond ‘fragmented’ CJADC2 deployments with $2B budget request

    Tucked into the Pentagon’s budget materials for fiscal 2027 is a request for more than $2 billion to purchase command-and-control technology licenses and engineering support for the U.S. combatant commands, Joint Staff and National Guard Bureau. That total includes more than $1.5 billion to expand defense users’ access to Palantir’s Maven Smart System in support of the Defense Department’s “Joint Force AI-Enabled Headquarters initiative” and $60 million for the “Virtual Joint Operations Center (VJOC) initiative.” Little has been disclosed publicly about those two efforts to date, and a Pentagon spokesperson declined to share more information about them with DefenseScoop this week. However, the budget documents indicate that the department is looking to swiftly consolidate “software-centric C2 onto a single pane of glass” over the next fiscal year. The DOD’s foundational concept for Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control (CJADC2), which broadly involves breaking down long-standing boundaries between the military services to enable a unified network where all sensors and shooters can seamlessly connect, started to take clear shape in the early 2020s. A House subcommittee will hold an open hearing next week on how frontier artificial intelligence models are shaping the cybersecurity landscape, for good and for ill. The June 4 hearing will be the second the Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection has held that was focused at least in part on the subject, following a similar hearing held in December. But unlike at that joint subcommittee hearing, where members also examined other emerging technologies, AI takes center stage next week. It caps a series of closed-door meetings of the Homeland panel where members and staff have been evaluating the intersection of AI and cyber. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.

    6 min
  8. Tech Force touts 200 hires

    May 28

    Tech Force touts 200 hires

    Workers hired under the Trump administration’s Tech Force program are gradually making their way into the government. About 200 people have been hired so far, and onboarding began over the past couple of weeks, Tech Force Director Kevin Hennecken told an audience gathered in a meeting room within the U.S. Capitol Visitor’s Center on Wednesday. He estimated about 10 people have been onboarded and expects that to be over 100 next month. The goal, he said, is to have about 300 to 500 workers by the end of summer. “Going from hiring to onboarding in the government can take a little bit of time,” Hennecken said. “We’re moving as fast as we can.” Immigration and Customs Enforcement is spending more than five times what it did last year on a single vendor’s identity verification technology, according to procurement documents published this month. ICE’s contract with BI2 Technologies from Sept. 24, 2025 to Sept. 23, 2026 totaled $4.6 million, while the new award, set to run from June 1, 2026 to May 31, 2027, surpasses the $25 million mark. The Massachusetts-based, venture capital-backed vendor will supply ICE agents with an additional batch of 1,570 iris-scanning devices. The handheld devices are wireless and connect to BI2 Technologies’ Inmate Identification and Recognition System, which provides access to 5 million-plus booking records, including arrest and incarceration data from 47 states. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.

    6 min
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4.8
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About

A podcast covering the latest news & trends facing top government leaders on topics such as technology, management & workforce. Hosted by Billy Mitchell on FedScoop and released Monday-Friday.

Information

  • Creator
    The Daily Scoop Podcast
  • Years Active
    2021 - 2026
  • Episodes
    500
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © All rights reserved
  • Show Website
    The Daily Scoop Podcast

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