November 3rd was the last date for public comments on most of the early template changes to the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) “revolutionary” overhaul. Templates for revisions to all of the FAR have now been released. While impressive that the Executive Branch team has completed its core work of the first comprehensive rewrite of the FAR, and while the analyses of the changes proposed to each of the parts of the FAR are continuing, contractors should still be vigilant about how these changes are being addressed by individual federal agencies. 

Timeline and Key Templates of the FAR Rewrite

This FAR rewrite was launched by President Trump’s Executive Order 14275 on April 15, 2025 (i) with a target completion date of 180 days (ii) The final two sections of the FAR rewrite, covering Part 2 (relating to “Definitions of Words and Terms”) and Part 52 (relating to “Solicitation provisions and Contract Clauses”) were published on October 28, 2025, twenty-eight days into the Fiscal Year 2026 “shutdown” due to the lapse in appropriations. The last seven substantive changes to specific parts of the FAR were published on September 30, 2025.  

Agency Deviation Requirement Creates Inconsistency

But publishing the templates for each of the current Parts of the FAR was only the first, albeit a significant, step in the FAR overhaul process. From the outset of the FAR overhaul design, agencies were tasked with the responsibility for issuing class deviations to their own FAR supplements, based on the common templates (iii). As I previously noted (iv), this requirement for individual agency deviations has created confusion and inconsistency across the government – even though eliminating such confusion and inconsistency was the core objective of creating and maintaining the government-wide FAR from its April 1984 inception.  

Low Compliance: Tracking Agency Deviations

Throughout this FAR overhaul process, the Department of Defense/Department of War has been an integral participant in creating the various templates but has not issued a single class deviation to its Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation (DFARS). Furthermore, even excluding the last seven substantive changes that were issued on September 30, and the final two updated that were issued on October 28, agencies have failed to timely meet their obligations to publish deviations implementing the template changes within their own agencies.  

The high-water mark for agency-published deviations was for the very first FAR overhaul template that was published on May 2, 2025, covering FAR Part 1. By August 7, 2025, 31 agencies had published a class deviation modifying their own agency acquisition supplement and none have been published since August 7. The first agency to act was the Millennium Challenge Corporation on May 8; the last was the U.S. Agency for International Development on August 7, 2025. However, as of October 31, 2025, that 31 number of agency-issued deviations was reached only one other time during this process, covering FAR Part 10 (relating to market research). Even excluding all of the FAR templates that were first published during September or October, the number of agency deviations published by October 31, 2025, range from a low of seventeen (for both FAR Parts 28 and 48) to a high of twenty-nine (for FAR Part 34)(v).   

Contractor Due Diligence: Varying Effective Dates

In addition, the effective date of each published agency deviation varies. For example, for the May 2, 2025, template changes to FAR Part 1, most were effective upon publication, with effective dates for any specific agency ranging throughout May to August, and several were made retroactive to the May 2 template publication.  

Thus, contractors pursuing new procurement opportunities at a federal agency need to know what class deviations that agency has already issued, what is the effective date of each of those deviations, and whether those deviations have been properly incorporated into their new solicitations.   

Challenges to Agency Action

There is no doubt that the September publication of so many of the FAR rewrite templates, coupled with the government shutdown that likely furloughed many of the agency personnel responsible for issuing their own deviations, has affected agencies completing these actions. But what accounts for the incomplete action on earlier template publications? 

The Next Steps in the FAR Overhaul Process

The next steps in the overhaul process will be the FAR rewrite team’s review of the “informal” public comments that have been submitted to each template publication, followed by a determination to make any revisions to the templates/deviations, and then to publish the integrated FAR rewrite for official public comment.   

According to the May 2, 2025, OMB memo: 

“After the FAR Council has posted model deviation guidance for all FAR parts, it will turn to formal rulemaking using the notice and comment process set forth at 41 U.S.C. § 1707. The rulemaking will be informed by the model deviation text, public input on the text received on the RFO website, operational experience with agency deviations, recommendations from agency points of contact identified pursuant to subsection (b), testing of the buying guides, and other appropriate inputs.” 

Conclusion: Focus on Agency Deviations and DFARS

While there is still a long way to go on the formal FAR overhaul process before it becomes effective, in the near term the name of the game is in the agency deviations to their own acquisition supplements and when and how they are incorporated into agency acquisitions. We’re also waiting for action by the Department of Defense to modify its DFARS rules to align with the FAR templates. Contractors should closely follow their key agencies for publishing additional deviations and for implementation into upcoming solicitations. I’ll be watching their actions, as well.  

If you have any questions or need any additional information, please do not hesitate to contact me at achvotkin@protoraelaw.com, or contact the Protorae Law attorney with whom you normally work.   

Works Cited

i Executive Order 14275 of April 15, 2025, titled “Restoring Common Sense to Federal Procurement.” 
ii The 180-day target date for completion, as provided for in Section 4 of the Executive Order, was October 15, 2025.
iii See Office of Management and Budget Memorandum M-25-26 (May 2, 2025), titled “Overhauling the Federal Acquisition Regulation”, and one from the FAR Council providing “Deviation Guidance to Support the Overhaul of the Federal Acquisition Regulation.” Under this FAR Council directive, agencies are to issue these deviations within 30 days of the release of the model deviation.
iv See my June 4, 2025, blog for Centre Law & Consulting titled “FAR Overhaul – Emphasizing Speed Over Uniformity.”
v As of November 3, 2025, I’ve not completed my matrix to show which agency has issued a deviation for each Part issued. However, on November 3, GSA’s senior acquisition executive, Jeff Koses, posted on LinkedIn that GSA, the Department of Agriculture, and the Department of Homeland Security have issued all of required deviations. That leave 28 agencies that have not completed publication of deviations for the templates for each of the FAR Parts, including zero deviations published by the Department of Defense/Department of War.