SBA Size Proposal Destroys Opportunities for Truly Small Businesses

I urge you to oppose the Trump administration's proposal to dramatically expand the SBA's definition of "small business" (Small Business Size Standards; Docket ID SBA-2026-0199) and to introduce and support legislation that protects small business size standards from unilateral redefinition. The proposal by Kelly Loeffler would increase revenue and employee thresholds across hundreds of industries. Engineering services would jump from $25.5 million to $252 million. Casinos from $34 million to $744 million. Financial services up to $1 billion in revenue or 3,000 employees. Approximately 37,000 firms currently holding $71 billion in federal contracts would suddenly become newly eligible as small businesses. This is not reform. This abandons the SBA's core mission. I've worked for a small business and understand how size standards function in procurement when bidding for jobs. When realistic, they work. A one- or two-person IT consulting firm can bid on small business set-asides. A local construction or plumbing company with three or four employees can compete fairly against similarly sized firms. The playing field is level, and actual small businesses get opportunities. This proposal destroys that. A real estate firm with fifty employees and $30 million in revenue would qualify as small. An IT services company with 200 employees and $150 million in revenue would compete against a two-person consulting practice for the same contracts. Don't think that this is just limited to federal. Many state and local governments mirror federal requirements. Under this proposal, the genuinely small firm loses every time. It cannot match pricing, field the necessary team, demonstrate comparable past performance, or absorb financial risk. Federal procurement mandates require 23 percent of contracting dollars go to small businesses, nearly $273 billion annually. If this proposal passes, that statutory requirement will be technically satisfied while dollars concentrate among mid-sized and larger corporations. Set-asides meant to help businesses that cannot compete against large corporations will instead advantage those very corporations. The SBA was created in 1953 precisely because small businesses cannot compete fairly. This proposal reverses that principle. I ask you to reject the current proposal, support legislation that prevents such an obscene change in size standards. Adjustments should be based only on inflation, not on a particular administration's desire to further enrich its cronies. Ask the SBA in particular, and administration in general, pointed questions in public hearings about why giving federal contracting advantages to multi-hundred-million-dollar corporations is consistent with supporting small business. I further ask that you encourage your constituents, many of whom are small business owners themselves, to go to regulations.gov and post their own comments on this change to Docket #SBA-2026-0199 Small Business Size Adjustments. This must be done by September 21st. The thirty-day comment window is way too short for a change of this magnitude, affecting 90% of the businesses in America.