II
119THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION S. 731
To prohibit conflicts of interest among consulting firms that simultaneously
contract with China or other covered foreign entities and the United
States Government, and for other purposes.
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
FEBRUARY25, 2025
Mr. H
AWLEY(for himself, Mr. PETERS, and Mr. SCOTTof Florida) introduced
the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee
on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
A BILL
To prohibit conflicts of interest among consulting firms that
simultaneously contract with China or other covered for-
eign entities and the United States Government, and
for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Time to Choose Act 4
of 2025’’. 5
SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 6
Congress makes the following findings: 7
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(1) The Department of Defense and other agen-1
cies in the United States Government regularly 2
award contracts to firms that are simultaneously 3
providing consulting services to foreign governments 4
and proxies or affiliates thereof. 5
(2) The provision of such consulting services to 6
covered foreign entities may support efforts by cer-7
tain foreign governments to generate economic and 8
military power that they can then use to undermine 9
the economic and national security of the American 10
people. 11
(3) It is a conflict of interest for consulting 12
firms to simultaneously aid in the efforts of certain 13
foreign governments to undermine the economic and 14
national security of the United States while they are 15
simultaneously contracting with Federal agencies re-16
sponsible for protecting and defending the United 17
States from foreign threats. 18
(4) Firms should be prevented from engaging in 19
such a conflict of interest and should instead be re-20
quired to choose between aiding the efforts of cer-21
tain foreign governments or helping the United 22
States Government to support and defend its citi-23
zens. 24
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SEC. 3. PROHIBITION ON FEDERAL CONTRACTING WITH 1
ENTITIES THAT ARE SIMULTANEOUSLY AID-2
ING IN THE EFFORTS OF COVERED FOREIGN 3
ENTITIES. 4
(a) I
NGENERAL.—In order to end conflicts of inter-5
est in Federal contracting among consulting firms that si-6
multaneously contract with the United States Government 7
and covered foreign entities, the Federal Acquisition Reg-8
ulatory Council shall, not later than 1 year after the date 9
of the enactment of this Act, amend the Federal Acquisi-10
tion Regulation— 11
(1) to require any entity that makes an offer or 12
quotation to provide consulting services to an execu-13
tive agency, including services described in the 14
North American Industry Classification System’s In-15
dustry Group code 5416, prior to entering into a 16
Federal contract, to certify that neither it nor any 17
of its subsidiaries or affiliates hold a consulting con-18
tract with one or more covered foreign entities; and 19
(2) to prohibit Federal contracts for consulting 20
services from being awarded to an entity that pro-21
vides consulting services, including services described 22
under the North American Industry Classification 23
System’s Industry Group code 5416 if the entity or 24
any of its subsidiaries or affiliates are determined, 25
based on the self-certification required under para-26
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graph (1), to be a contractor of, or are otherwise 1
providing consulting services to, a covered foreign 2
entity. 3
(b) W
AIVER.— 4
(1) I
N GENERAL.—Subject to the limitations in 5
paragraph (2), the head of an executive agency may 6
waive the conflict of interest restrictions under this 7
section on a case-by-case basis if— 8
(A) the agency head, in consultation with 9
the Secretary of Defense and the Director of 10
National Intelligence, determines the waiver to 11
be in the national security interests of the 12
United States; 13
(B) the agency head determines that no 14
other entity without a conflict of interest under 15
this section can perform the work for the Fed-16
eral contract; 17
(C) the head of the executive agency sub-18
mits to the Director of the Office of Manage-19
ment and Budget a notification of such waiver 20
at least 5 days prior to issuing the waiver; 21
(D) the head of the executive agency sub-22
mits to the appropriate congressional commit-23
tees a notification of such waiver within 30 24
days in unclassified form (accompanied by a 25
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classified annex if necessary) and offers a brief-1
ing to those committees on the information in-2
cluded in the notification; and 3
(E) the contracting agency publishes in an 4
easily accessible location on the agency’s public 5
website a list of the names of the covered for-6
eign entities to which the entity receiving a 7
waiver provides consulting services, unless the 8
head of the applicable executive agency, with 9
the approval of the Director of the Office of 10
Management and Budget, and in consultation 11
with the Secretary of Defense and Director of 12
National Intelligence, determines that such pub-13
lic disclosure would directly harm the national 14
security interests of the United States. 15
(2) L
IMITATIONS.— 16
(A) D
URATION.—A waiver granted under 17
paragraph (1) shall last for a period of not 18
more than 365 days. The head of the applicable 19
executive agency, with the approval of the Di-20
rector of the Office of Management and Budg-21
et, and in consultation with the Secretary of 22
Defense and Director of National Intelligence, 23
may extend a waiver granted under such para-24
graph one time, for a period up to 180 days 25
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after the date on which the waiver would other-1
wise expire, if such an extension is in the na-2
tional security interests of the United States 3
and the Director of the Office of Management 4
and Budget submits to the appropriate congres-5
sional committees a notification of such waiver 6
and offers a briefing to those committees on the 7
information included in the notification. 8
(B) N
UMBER.—Not more than one total 9
waiver across all executive agencies may be 10
granted under paragraph (1) to a single entity 11
at a given time. 12
(C) N
OTIFICATION REQUIREMENTS .—The 13
notification required under subparagraphs (C) 14
and (D) of paragraph (1) shall include the fol-15
lowing information: 16
(i) Information on the contractor, in-17
cluding— 18
(I) the name, address, and cor-19
porate structure of the contractor; 20
(II) the name, address, and cor-21
porate structure of any subsidiaries or 22
subcontractors involved; 23
(III) all foreign ownership of the 24
contractor; 25
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(IV) all foreign real estate owned 1
by the contractor; and 2
(V) an employee designated as 3
responsible for managing any conflict 4
of interests that may arise as part of 5
the contract. 6
(ii) Information on the covered foreign 7
entities involved to the extent known by 8
the contractor, including— 9
(I) the name and address of the 10
covered foreign entity; 11
(II) the name and address of any 12
subsidiaries or subcontractors in-13
volved; 14
(III) a complete history of any 15
contracts between the covered foreign 16
entity and the contractor; 17
(IV) all ownership of the covered 18
foreign entity; and 19
(V) any legal authorities pro-20
viding a foreign government with ac-21
cess or control over the covered for-22
eign entity. 23
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(iii) Information on the nature of the 1
work performed for the covered foreign en-2
tities, including— 3
(I) the projected and actual dol-4
lar value of the contract; 5
(II) the projected and actual du-6
ration of the contract; 7
(III) the projected and actual 8
number of employees to work on the 9
contract; 10
(IV) the projected and actual 11
number of employees who are United 12
States citizens who work on the con-13
tract; 14
(V) the projected and actual 15
number of employees who currently or 16
formerly held security clearances with 17
the United States Government who 18
work on the contract; 19
(VI) the subject matter of the 20
contract; 21
(VII) any materials provided to 22
the covered foreign entity in order to 23
secure the contract; 24
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(VIII) any tracking number used 1
by the covered foreign entity to iden-2
tify the contract; 3
(IX) any tracking number or in-4
formation used by the contractor to 5
identify the contract; and 6
(X) any military or intelligence 7
applications that could benefit from 8
the contract. 9
(iv) Justification of the executive 10
agency’s need for providing the waiver. 11
(v) An acceptable management over-12
sight plan to ensure that the work per-13
formed for the covered foreign entities does 14
not compromise the work being performed 15
for the Federal Government or harm the 16
national security of the United States, to 17
be approved at not lower than the Deputy 18
Secretary level at the contracting agency. 19
(3) C
ONTRACTOR REPORTING .—The executive 20
agency granting a waiver under this subsection shall 21
require the contractor, in the event the contractor 22
identifies any of the following during the perform-23
ance of the contract, to report the following informa-24
tion to the executive agency: 25
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(A) Any human rights violations that are 1
known to the contractor through information 2
provided to the contractor in the course of the 3
contract. 4
(B) Any religious liberty violations that are 5
known to the contractor through information 6
provided to the contractor in the course of the 7
contract. 8
(C) Any risks to United States economic or 9
national security identified by the contractor in 10
the course of the contract. 11
SEC. 4. PENALTIES FOR FALSE INFORMATION. 12
(a) T
ERMINATION, SUSPENSION, ANDDEBAR-13
MENT.—If the head of an executive agency determines 14
that a consulting firm described in section 3(a)(1) has 15
knowingly submitted a false certification or information 16
on or after the date on which the Federal Acquisition Reg-17
ulatory Council amends the Federal Acquisition Regula-18
tion pursuant to such section, the head of the executive 19
agency shall terminate the contract with the consulting 20
firm and consider suspending or debarring the firm from 21
eligibility for future Federal contracts in accordance with 22
subpart 9.4 of the Federal Acquisition Regulation. 23
(b) F
ALSECLAIMSACT.—A consulting firm de-24
scribed in section 3(a)(1) that, for the purposes of the 25
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False Claims Act, knowingly hides or misrepresents one 1
or more contracts with covered foreign entities, or other-2
wise violates the False Claims Act, shall be subject to the 3
penalties and corrective actions described in the False 4
Claims Act, including liability for three times the amount 5
of damages which the United States Government sustains. 6
SEC. 5. DEFINITIONS. 7
In this Act: 8
(1) A
PPROPRIATE CONGRESSIONAL COMMIT -9
TEES.—The term ‘‘appropriate congressional com-10
mittees’’ means the Committee on Homeland Secu-11
rity and Governmental Affairs of the Senate and the 12
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform of 13
the House of Representatives. 14
(2) C
ONSULTING SERVICES .—The term ‘‘con-15
sulting services’’ means advisory or assistance serv-16
ices similar to those defined in Federal Acquisition 17
Regulation 2.101, but for the purposes of this Act 18
includes services provided to covered foreign entities, 19
except that the term does not include the provision 20
of products or services related to— 21
(A) compliance with legal, audit, account-22
ing, tax, reporting, or other requirements of the 23
laws and standards of countries; or 24
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(B) participation in a judicial, legal, or eq-1
uitable dispute resolution proceeding. 2
(3) C
OVERED FOREIGN ENTITY .—The term 3
‘‘covered foreign entity’’ means any of the following: 4
(A) The Government of the People’s Re-5
public of China, the Chinese Communist Party, 6
the People’s Liberation Army, the Ministry of 7
State Security, or other security service or in-8
telligence agency of the People’s Republic of 9
China. 10
(B) The Government of the Russian Fed-11
eration or any entity sanctioned by the Sec-12
retary of the Treasury under Executive Order 13
13662 titled ‘‘Blocking Property of Additional 14
Persons Contributing to the Situation in 15
Ukraine’’ (79 Fed. Reg. 16169). 16
(C) The government of any country if the 17
Secretary of State determines that such govern-18
ment has repeatedly provided support for acts 19
of international terrorism pursuant to any of 20
the following: 21
(i) Section 1754(c)(1)(A) of the Ex-22
port Control Reform Act of 2018 (50 23
U.S.C. 4318(c)(1)(A)). 24
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(ii) Section 620A of the Foreign As-1
sistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2371). 2
(iii) Section 40 of the Arms Export 3
Control Act (22 U.S.C. 2780). 4
(iv) Any other provision of law. 5
(D) Any entity included on any of the fol-6
lowing lists maintained by the Department of 7
Commerce: 8
(i) The Entity List set forth in Sup-9
plement No. 4 to part 744 of the Export 10
Administration Regulations. 11
(ii) The Denied Persons List as de-12
scribed in section 764.3(a)(2) of the Ex-13
port Administration Regulations. 14
(iii) The Unverified List set forth in 15
Supplement No. 6 to part 744 of the Ex-16
port Administration Regulations. 17
(iv) The Military End User List set 18
forth in Supplement No. 7 to part 744 of 19
the Export Administration Regulations. 20
(E) Any entity identified by the Secretary 21
of Defense pursuant to section 1237(b) of the 22
Strom Thurmond National Defense Authoriza-23
tion Act for Fiscal Year 1999 (Public Law 24
105–261; 50 U.S.C. 1701 note). 25
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(F) Any entity on the Non-SDN Chinese 1
Military-Industrial Complex Companies List 2
(NS–CMIC List) maintained by the Office of 3
Foreign Assets Control of the Department of 4
the Treasury under Executive Order 14032 (86 5
Fed. Reg. 30145; relating to addressing the 6
threat from securities investments that finance 7
certain companies of the People’s Republic of 8
China), or any successor order. 9
(4) E
XECUTIVE AGENCY.—The term ‘‘executive 10
agency’’ has the meaning given the term in section 11
133 of title 41, United States Code. 12
(5) F
ALSE CLAIMS ACT .—The term ‘‘False 13
Claims Act’’ means sections 3729 through 3733 of 14
title 31, United States Code. 15
(6) N
ORTH AMERICAN INDUSTRY CLASSIFICA -16
TION SYSTEM’S INDUSTRY GROUP CODE 5416 .—The 17
term ‘‘North American Industry Classification Sys-18
tem’s Industry Group code 5416’’ refers to the 19
North American Industry Classification System cat-20
egory that covers Management, Scientific, and Tech-21
nical Consulting Services as Industry Group code 22
5416, including industry codes 54151, 541611, 23
541612, 541613, 541614, 541618, 54162, 541620, 24
54169, and 541690. 25
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SEC. 6. NO ADDITIONAL FUNDING. 1
No additional funds are authorized to be appro-2
priated for the purpose of carrying out this Act. 3
Æ
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