Sponsors
The bill helps more small businesses compete for larger contracts and strengthens oversight of the bonding program, but does so at the cost of diverting a small portion of the fund to administration and creating risks of temporary reduced bonding capacity and added implementation complexity.
Small-business owners can obtain larger individual surety bonds (increase from $6.5M to $8M), enabling them to bid for and win larger contracts.
Small-business owners and program stakeholders will benefit from improved SBA program administration and oversight because the SBA may use up to 2% of the revolving fund for administration/IT/outreach and the bill requires annual SBA reporting plus GAO review to increase transparency.
Small-business owners could temporarily lose access to larger bonding if the SBA requests supplemental funds, because individual bond limits would fall by about 33% during that period, reducing their ability to pursue large contracts.
Taxpayers and small businesses face increased risk because allowing the SBA to use up to 2% of the revolving fund for administrative costs reduces funds available to cover claims or guarantees, potentially increasing taxpayer exposure or reducing program capacity.
Federal employees, sureties, and small-business applicants may face short-term administrative burden and complexity from changing limits, new notification, and reporting requirements during implementation.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Increases the Surety Bond Program per-surety cap to $8M with temporary 33% reductions during supplemental fund requests, allows 2% of the fund for admin, and adds reporting and GAO review requirements.
Introduced July 9, 2025 by Edward John Markey · Last progress April 29, 2026
Raises the maximum per-surety bond limit for the SBA’s Surety Bond Program from $6.5 million to $8.0 million and adds temporary authority to reduce that cap by up to 33% in certain fiscal years when the SBA requests supplemental funding. It also allows the SBA to obligate up to 2% of the revolving fund balance at the start of each fiscal year for administrative costs, tightens notification requirements when the SBA seeks supplemental funds, and requires annual program reporting to congressional Small Business committees plus a GAO review of approval processes with recommendations.