President Sarkozy's visit, Federal Contracting Reform

Yesterday, Olympia and I served as part of the escort committee for France's President Sarkozy when he addressed a joint session of the Congress. In sharp contrast to when former President Chirac spoke at a joint session, this time most members of the House and the Senate attended the address. It was good to hear a French President reaffirm the strong bond between our two countries and give a speech extolling the virtues of America and recalling the liberation of France during World War II. Drawing on my many years of French classes in Caribou and in college, I tried briefly to see if I could follow along with the written French text of the speech, but I soon gave in to wearing the earphones that allowed access to a simultaneous translation. At the reception afterwards for the President and the members of the escort committee, I did greet President Sarkozy in French, but I have to admit that my French is awfully rusty, and my accent has never been good.

It was fun to see some of our House colleagues. Although I know some members very well from working on homeland security and other legislation, there is not as much contact day-to-day between House members and Senators as most people would think. I had a nice chat with several House members, both Democrats and Republicans, including Rep. Ron Kind of Wisconsin, who played football in college with my chief of staff, Steve Abbott.

Last night, the Senate unanimously passed a comprehensive bill that I authored to reform federal contracting. This legislation grew out of hearings I held last year on contracting abuses in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and in Iraqi reconstruction projects. I worked closely with the GAO and the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction in drafting the bipartisan bill, which was cosponsored by Senators Joe Lieberman (D-CT), Norm Coleman (R-MN), Claire McCaskill (D-MO), and Tom Carper (D-DE). The legislation will implement many reforms, including requiring more competition in the award of government contracts. Fewer than 50 percent of federal contracts are awarded using full and open competition despite the obvious benefits of lower prices and better quality that competition helps to ensure. The bill will also ensure that federal agencies have a greater number of highly skilled contracting officers to handle the $400 billion worth of contracts awarded in a year.

All in all, a good day!