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SBIR/STTR awards remain vulnerable to foreign influence

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3 months ago

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Of the 12 agencies running the Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs, only one has made significant progress to prevent or limit foreign adversaries from taking advantage of the research and development funding.

New data from Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), chairwoman of the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, shows that the National Institutes of Health both flagged and denied all applications that included companies or people from places like China and Russia.

Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) is the chairwoman of the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

“The SBIR-STTR programs provide a valuable pipeline of technology that we cannot allow China and other foreign adversaries to steal,” Ernst said in a release. “Most concerning is that a small group of companies receiving the lion’s share of funding are engaging in problematic business and research relationships with Communist Chinese Party agents.”

Ernst’s staff collected data from a dozen agencies in November 2024 asking them for their due diligence data based on a requirement in the 2022 SBIR-STTR Extension Act.

Congress included a provision, authored by Ernst, to require agencies to screen for possible foreign influence in these programs. The provision required agencies to assess the security risks of each small business application.

That data formed the basis for an investigation report, Critical American Technology Vulnerable to China, showing 10 agencies either didn’t flag applications or if they did, the overall number they denied was low relative to the number flagged.

The Homeland Security Department flagged and denied one application. The Energy Department did not respond to the request.

In 2023 and 2024, agencies identified 835 applications for SBIR-STTR funding. Of those, 303 — or 36% — were denied.

Additionally, the investigation looked at continuing concerns about “SBIR mills,” which companies that take advantage of the program to win several awards, but never end up commercializing the technology. Ernst’s staff says six of the largest 25 SBIR/STTR awardees at the Department of Defense have “clear links to countries like China and still received nearly $180 million in DoD awards in 2023 and 2024.”

SBIR mills have long been a concern in Congress. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), former ranking member of the Small Business Committee and now chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, held up the SBIR/STTR reauthorization effort back in 2022 over his concerns.

He said at the time, 21% of the SBIR awards from 2009 to 2019 went to these “mills.” But experts and other data showed Paul’s concerns were overblown.

The new data from Ernst, however, is less about the number of firms winning SBIR/STTR awards and more about who is benefiting from them.

“A review of the 25 companies in DoD’s SBIR/STTR program with the most awards from 2010 to 2023 receiving 7,251 awards amounting to a total of $3.23 billion, all of which are considered a SBIR mill, showed many of these firms had troubling ties with foreign adversaries,” the report stated. “This evaluation revealed that at least 6 out of the top 25 SBIR mills had problematic relationships with foreign adversaries yet continued to receive awards even after implementation of due diligence requirements. In 2023 and 2024, these firms received 297 awards amounting to a total of $178.4 million.”

The data DoD provided to the committee says out of 522 applications flagged for possible risks of foreign adversarial involvement, 152 were denied (29%).

Data from NASA showed the agency flagged 125 applications, but denied just one due to foreign risks. NASA said it denied another 107 for technical reasons rather than concerns over foreign risks.

NIH, on the other hand, flagged and denied all 144 applications where foreign influence was a concern.

Other agencies — including the Department of Agriculture, the National Science Foundation, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) — flagged a small number and denied even fewer.

“Based on 11 congressional briefings that further outlined due diligence implementation, it became evident that there were inconsistencies in how agencies identify foreign ties risks and determine when an application should be denied,” the report stated. “Some agencies seem willing to approve an applicant with significant foreign ties risk when agency officials are determined to fund a certain technological capability, no matter the consequences.”

Ernst’s investigation comes as Congress must reauthorize the SBIR/STTR programs. The 2022 update expires on Sept. 30. Ernst’s Innovate Act would extend the programs another three years to 2028 and continue to press agencies to address concerns over SBIR mills and foreign influence on awards.

The bill would establish a more clear and consistent definition of foreign risk to include a foreign affiliation, technology licensing agreement, joint venture, contractual or financial obligation, investment agreement, research relationship or business relationship. It also would establish a cap of $75 million in SBIR/STTR Phase 1 and 2 awards per company, including subsidiaries.

In addition to Ernst’s bill, Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Rep Nydia Velazquez (D-N.Y.), the ranking members of the Committees on Small Business, introduced in May the SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act of 2025. Their bill would make the programs permanent, extend the due diligence program until 2030, and increase research funding to these firms.

Despite concerns about foreign influence and SBIR mills, experts say the program has been a success story over the last 40 years.

The Public Spend Forum found in a 2023 report that agencies made more than $3.7 billion in awards in 2023 up from approximately $2.8 billion in 2018. Additionally, agencies also expanded their investments in emerging areas like biotechnology and medical technology, and out of 10,000 companies, 40% self-identified as disadvantaged businesses.

The post SBIR/STTR awards remain vulnerable to foreign influence first appeared on Federal News Network.

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Musk Has Gone Quiet About the Launch of His ‘America Party’ — Here’s What We Know

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15 hours ago

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August 13, 2025

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Maybe Elon Musk is more interested in planets than politics.

The mega-billionaire founder of Tesla, owner of X, and the genius behind the pioneering company SpaceX caused a huge stir in early July when he announced the birth of a new third party on the American political scene.

The question now is, whatever became of that?

Musk first broached the subject in a July 4 post on X when he launched a poll to find out what his followers thought. The results weren’t even close.

“By a factor of 2 to 1, you want a new political party and you shall have it!” Musk wrote in a July 5 post.

“Today, the America Party is formed to give you back your freedom.”

Naturally, the post caused a splash.

Elon Musk is one of the few names in politics that can even come close to competing with the star power of President Donald Trump. So the idea that he could be mounting an actual challenge to Trump’s Republican Party would have been news indeed.

But as The Daily Caller White House correspondent Reagan Reese wrote in an article published Monday, there appears to be nothing in the way of follow-through coming yet.

“Musk hasn’t even mentioned the effort in over a month, and insiders told the Daily Caller that it seems Musk has begun to realize just how difficult what he pledged to do would be,” Reese wrote.

At the time of Musk’s announcement, Trump branded the idea of a third party “ridiculous.”

Musk, of course, has other things on his plate besides politics.

As USA Today reported last week, Musk’s SpaceX could be nearing a new test flight for its Starship rocket, a 400-foot spacecraft the newspaper called “crucial” to future space ambitions, for Musk and the country as a whole.

Musk is a very public booster of manned trips to Mars — extraterrestrial exploration is vital “for the long-term survival of civilization,” he said, USA Today reported.

Humanity is essentially faced with the prospect of branching out or dying out.

One path means “we stay on Earth forever and then there will be some sort of eventual extinction event,” he wrote in a 2017 paper published by the journal New Space.

According to the electronics news-centric website CNET, Musk told the SXSW festival in Austin, Texas, in 2013 that he wants to die on Mars — “just not on impact.”

There are also very earthly concerns for Musk to consider about starting a party that would compete almost exclusively with Republicans for support.

(Besides Musk’s famously libertarian inclinations — free speech, gun rights, etc. — his popularity among liberals is so low it can be measured in the number of Tesla vehicles damaged and dealerships attacked by leftists.)

According to Reese’s report, a former Department of Government Efficiency consultant who launched a political action committee specifically to counter the threat of a Musk third party said Musk has realized that helping Democrats might not be so helpful to his own interests.

“Make no mistake, there is a real threat to both Elon and to his businesses if the Democrats were to regain control,” James Fishback, CEO of the Arizona investment firm Azoria, told Reese.

“That’s a message that I shared privately with Tesla executives, and that may have been part of the reason why he attenuated his positioning on that.”

Musk can be unpredictable, of course. He’s a generational genius, and geniuses make their own decisions and forge their own paths.

But for now, at least, it appears his third party is going to stay in the background of the political stage.

This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.

The post Musk Has Gone Quiet About the Launch of His ‘America Party’ — Here’s What We Know appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

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Chinese Ships Collide: Karmic Payback for Years of Bullying the Philippine Coast Guard

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16 hours ago

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August 13, 2025

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RudolphChen, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

On an ongoing basis, the Chinese Coast Guard has harassed and intimidated Philippine Coast Guard and fishing vessels in the South China Sea. China claims almost the entire sea, while the Permanent Court of Arbitration has rejected China’s claims. As the Philippine ships and vessels continues to use territory which the world recognizes as belonging to the Philippines, China has historically used bully tactics, blocking, ramming, and damaging Philippine vessels or shooting them with high powered water cannons. This week, China was dished some karmic justice when two of its bully ships collided, rendering one of them on seaworthy.

This increased aggression by China is one of the primary reasons why the US Navy conducts freedom of navigation patrols in the region.

On Monday, August 11, 2025, two Chinese vessels collided while pursuing Philippine Coast Guard ships near Scarborough Shoal in the South China Sea. The Chinese Coast Guard cutter CCG 3104 struck the PLA Navy guided-missile destroyer Guilin (hull number 164) a botched blockade attempt.

The clash occurred as Philippine Coast Guard vessels BRP Teresa Magbanua and BRP Suluan escorted the fishing vessel MV Pamamalakaya and 35 local fishing boats as part of Manila’s Kadiwa Operation, which delivers fuel and supplies to Filipino fishermen operating in the country’s western exclusive economic zone.

Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Commodore Jay Tarriela said CCG 3104, while chasing the BRP Suluan at high speed, attempted a risky maneuver from the vessel’s starboard quarter. The cutter’s movement caused it to ram into the Guilin, which was approaching from the other side. Analysts believe the Chinese ships were trying to “sandwich” the Philippine cutter, forcing it into the path of a close-range water cannon blast. Poor coordination turned the maneuver into a self-inflicted collision.

The impact left CCG 3104 “unseaworthy,” with significant damage to its bow and forecastle. The Chinese crew did not respond to the Philippine ship’s offer of assistance, and it remains unclear if there were any injuries.

The involvement of the Chinese Navy destroyer Guilin in the Scarborough Shoal collision was considered highly unusual and “overkill” by analysts. PLA Navy warships typically remain “over the horizon” and avoid direct engagement, leaving such confrontations to the Chinese Coast Guard. This made the August 11 incident one of the most severe encounters between Chinese forces and the Philippines, highlighting the escalating tensions in the South China Sea.

Scarborough Shoal has been a persistent flashpoint since China seized it from the Philippines in 2012. Since then, Beijing has waged a steady campaign of harassment against Philippine civilian and government vessels, which has intensified in recent years. In February 2023, a Chinese Coast Guard vessel used a military-grade laser against a 44-meter Philippine Coast Guard ship during a resupply mission.

In March 2024, Chinese ships deployed water cannons on Philippine vessels, shattering a windshield and injuring crew members. The following month, three Chinese cutters rammed and blasted Philippine patrol boats with water cannons near Scarborough Shoal, while others threatened Filipino fishermen at Iroquois Reef. In January 2025, multiple Chinese vessels made aggressive maneuvers toward Philippine fisheries boats, forcing the suspension of a scientific survey.

Beijing justifies these actions through its “nine-dash line” claim, which asserts Chinese historical rights over roughly 90 percent of the South China Sea. The claim is based on a 1947 map created by the Nationalist government and later adopted by the Communist regime, citing historical records dating back to the Han Dynasty. Despite a 2016 international arbitration ruling rejecting the nine-dash line as having “no legal basis,” China has ignored the decision and continued to enforce its claims.

By enforcing the nine-dash line, Beijing seeks to transform these international waters into de facto sovereign territory in a process experts call “maritime territorialisation.”

Strategically, the South China Sea is a vital artery for global trade, with $3.36 trillion worth of goods passing through annually, including 80 percent of China’s energy imports. The waters are also rich in fishing grounds and contain large reserves of oil and natural gas.

Ironically, China is a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), while the United States is not. Yet it is the U.S. that serves as the principal enforcer of the law, and China that stands as its principal violator.

The post Chinese Ships Collide: Karmic Payback for Years of Bullying the Philippine Coast Guard appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

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$50 Million Bounty on Nicolás Maduro: A New Chapter in Counter-Terror Strategy.

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16 hours ago

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August 13, 2025

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This is a Gateway Hispanic article.

The post $50 Million Bounty on Nicolás Maduro: A New Chapter in Counter-Terror Strategy. appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

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