FCW Insider: Feb. 11

As part of the fiscal year 2021 budget proposal, the Trump administration is proposing a 1% pay increase for civilian federal employees. Congressional Democrats are pushing a bill with a 3.5% pay hike. Lia Russell has more.

Also in the budget, the administration is seeking a $150 million boost for the Technology Modernization Fund. Adam Mazmanian explains.

The scheduled March 28 launch of the Department of Veterans Affairs $16 billion health record system is being pushed back at least until the end of April. Adam reports.

A new policy backed by the White House will let the defense secretary roll back collective bargaining among civilian workers at the Department of Defense. Lia has the story.

The federal budget request provides a look at how the administration would prioritize cybersecurity spending across the Departments of Homeland Security, Energy, Treasury and other departments. Get more on the cyber budget from Derek B. Johnson

The Justice Department indicted four Chinese hackers for the 2017 Equifax breach. The charges are the latest example of U.S. law enforcement going after China for hacking American companies. Derek reports.

Quick Hits

*** Amazon Web Services is looking to depose President Donald Trump, current and former secretaries of defense Mark Esper and James Mattis along with Defense Department CIO Dana Deasy in their lawsuit protesting the award of the Pentagon's $10 billion cloud computing contract known as JEDI to rival Microsoft. The AWS complaint alleges that Trump's personal and political animus toward Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos led him to unduly influence the award decision.

*** The Office of Personnel Management released a memo identifying human resources flexibilities that could help support federal agency employees affected by the 2019 Novel Coronavirus, including telework, alternative work schedules, donated leave and more.