An explosive undercover investigation has raised fresh questions about how Native-owned federal contractors are exploiting a lucrative government set?aside program while taxpayers and genuine small businesses are left behind.
According to The Gateway Pundit, the OKeefe Media Group (OMG) released hidden-camera footage on Tuesday showing senior figures at Chenega Architecture and Design and Cherokee Federal openly acknowledging that firms are using Native ownership on paper to secure massive 8(a) contracts and then outsourcing most of the work.
Ricky Longhurst, a Senior Account Executive at Cherokee Federal, told an undercover OMG journalist that companies are claiming Native ownership to cheat the government, later conceding, Its cheating really. Mike Montgomery, President of Chenega Architecture and Design, detailed the financial arrangement, saying, We give 37% back to the tribe for infrastructure 63% goes back to the business.
The footage also captures Montgomery acknowledging that the executives running these operations are not themselves Native, despite the firms preferred status. When the OMG journalist pressed, So, how do you do that because you dont look Native? Montgomery replied, Im not Native, no. No, they hire business executives, that understand the federal marketspace but the board members are all Alaskans in the Chenega Tribe, adding, We have an incentive because of the Alaskan Native ownership.
OMG notes this is not an isolated case, pointing back to earlier undercover video involving ATI Government Solutions Contract Manager Melayne Cromwell, who admitted, We only do 20% the rest goes to subs. These companies, by their own account, are leveraging Native status to tap into 8(a) government contracts worth $100+ million, while pushing the bulk of the actual work to subcontractors and pocketing the spread.
After OMGs first report, Small Business Administration leadership was forced to respond to what conservatives have long warned is systemic abuse inside federal preference programs. SBA Administrator Kelly Loeffler announced that the SBA suspended 1,091 firms from the 8(a) Program, and said the agency took immediate action against companies taking advantage of the program, a step that underscores how entrenched this kind of cheating has become in a bureaucracy that too often favors identity politics over genuine competition and accountability.
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