In order to have the necessary standing to file a protest at the Government Accountability Office (GAO), a protester must qualify as an interested party. The GAO’s bid protest regulations define an interested party as an actual or prospective bidder or offeror whose direct economic interest would be affected by the award of a contract or by the failure to award a contract. A protester may challenge the procuring agency’s evaluation of the awardee’s proposal as an interested party when there is a reasonable possibility that its proposal would be next in line for award if the protest is sustained. In post-award protests with an intervening offeror between the awardee and the protester, the protester’s economic interest may be considered too remote to qualify as an interested party to raise certain challenges against the awardee’s proposal. This is because when there is an intervening offeror that would be next in line for award should the protester’s protest be sustained, that intervening offeror is deemed to have a greater economic interest in the procurement. To establish standing in such procurements, the protester must challenge the agency’s evaluation of the intervening offeror to either show that it possesses the necessary economic interest to raise the pertinent challenges or otherwise demonstrate that its competitive position is subject to change based on the errors it identifies in the government’s evaluation.

It is a fundamental tenet of government contracts that procuring agencies treat all offerors equally. In this regard, adjudicative forums have long held that procuring agencies must provide all offerors with a common basis for preparing and submitting proposals. Such equal treatment necessarily requires the government to evaluate proposals of all offerors impartially and evenhandedly against the solicitation requirements and the evaluation criteria. Furthermore, once the evaluation is complete, agencies must adequately document their award decision, which should reflect the equal application of the stated criteria to all proposals. If an agency disparately evaluates offerors with respect to the same solicitation requirements, it may be subject to a post-award protest. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) reviews protests alleging disparate treatment by examining the record to determine whether the agency’s evaluation decision was reasonable and in accordance with the evaluation factors provided in the request for proposals (RFP). The GAO will sustain the protest and typically recommend a reevaluation if it determines that the agency treated the offerors’ proposals disparately or unequally, such as by evaluating the protester’s proposal using a stricter standard than the awardee’s proposal.

The Government Accountability Office’s (GAO) bid protest regulations require protesters to provide a detailed statement of the legal and factual grounds of protest. While the GAO does not require protesters to file formal briefs or other technical forms of pleadings or motions, protesters must nevertheless file concise and logically arranged protests that clearly state legally sufficient protest grounds. On July 14, 2025, the GAO submitted a proposal in response to Section 885 of the Servicemember Quality of Life Improvement and National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2025, clarifying and enhancing its pleading standard. While this new pleading standard is not a significant change from the previous standard, it provides added clarification that protesters’ bare allegations are insufficient to meet GAO’s pleading requirements. Under this new standard, protesters must provide, at a minimum, credible allegations that are supported by evidence and are sufficient, if uncontradicted, to establish the likelihood of the protester’s claim of improper agency action. Stated another way, protesters must provide more than a bare allegation, such that the allegation is supported by some explanation and evidence that establishes the likelihood the protester will prevail in its claim. In practical terms, the GAO will continue to dismiss protests or specific allegations within that are based on speculation, factual inaccuracies, or flawed legal assumptions.