"The secretary of commerce is personally reviewing all contracts with commitments above $100,000 at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, causing backups and uncertainty in the agency that is responsible for the country's weather forecasts, marine fisheries management and coastal management. NOAA is housed within the Department of Commerce.
Howard Lutnick is reviewing all NOAA contracts above $100,000, according to three agency employees who spoke anonymously out of fear of retribution at work.
There are hundreds of such contracts across the agency that need to be reviewed each year and several that have been paused or otherwise impacted by the secretary's review, according to an agency employee familiar with the contracting process.
They include maintenance and service contracts for facilities like NOAA's headquarters in Maryland, where the bathrooms are running out of toilet paper; a contract for translating emergency alerts into other languages, which lapsed last week; and web-hosting contracts for key agency websites that almost went dark last week.
It's "just kind of a train wreck," says a NOAA staffer who spoke with NPR anonymously out of fear of retribution at their job."
Alejandra Borunda reports for NPR April 9, 2025.
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