Government Contracts Monitor

FAR Council Strengthens Buy American Rules

January 29, 2021

By: Lindsay Simmons

While all eyes seem to be on President Biden’s January 25, 2021 Executive Order Strengthening Buy American rules and goals, many have overlooked the January 19, 2021 final rule issued by the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Council that makes significant changes to long-standing rules under the Buy American Act. This rule strengthens domestic preferences under the Buy American statute by “making adjustments to the required percentage of domestic content and the existing percentages for the price evaluation preferences in an effort to decrease the amount of foreign-sourced content in a U.S. manufactured product to promote economic and national security, help stimulate economic growth, and create jobs.” 86 Fed. Register 6180.  

Under the new rule, the price evaluation preferences increase from 6 percent to 20 percent for large businesses and from 12 percent to 30 percent for small businesses. DoD procurements will remain the same – at 50 percent. In addition, the domestic content requirement for iron and steel increases from 50 percent to 95 percent. For other end products and construction materials, the domestic content requirement increases from 50 percent to 55 percent. 

This new rule implements Executive Order 13881, Maximizing Use of American-Made Goods, Products, and Materials and can be found here.

Lindsay Simmons is responsible for the content of this article @JacksonKelly.com