TSA cancelled the Gold+ solicitation on August 27. The notice says it is cancelled in its entirety, that cancellation is in the best interest of the Government, and that no award will be made.
We documented Gold+ from federal procurement records beginning in August 2025, nine months before TSA announced the program publicly, and we have written about it since. Its cancellation is a significant development and we are not treating it as anything else.
But three days before the cancellation, TSA said an evolved Screening Partnership Program would replace Gold+. That is the part worth understanding, because the contract vehicle an evolved Screening Partnership Program would run on was already awarded.
It happened on May 29, fifteen days after TSA announced Gold+ to the public. We have been tracking that solicitation since March 2025, fourteen months before Gold+ existed as a public program.
What Was Awarded
On May 29, TSA issued twenty-one orders of five thousand dollars each, one to each of twenty-one companies, with performance beginning June 1.
Five thousand dollars does not buy screening. It is the minimum guarantee, the token amount an agency obligates to each company to make a new contract vehicle legally binding. Issuing twenty-one of them on a single day is how a contract vehicle comes into existence.
The recipients match the list of companies TSA currently publishes as holders of the Screening Partnership Program vehicle.
TSA did not publicize the awards. They surfaced in no announcement, no press release, and no public notice. They exist in federal award records and nowhere else.
The first public word came on August 26, when one of the awardees issued a press release saying it had been awarded a position on the vehicle and was now positioned to compete for future aviation security work.
That was three months after the award, and two days after TSA said an evolved Screening Partnership Program would replace Gold+.
Who Is On It and Who Is Not
The list changed.
Several long-standing airport screening operators no longer hold positions. Several federal services and technology integration firms now do, including companies that had not previously operated a checkpoint.
One departure is worth stating on its own. Trinity Technology Group operates screening today at Sonoma County Airport under an active task order with roughly twenty million dollars obligated. Trinity is not among the twenty-one companies awarded positions in May.
An incumbent running an airport right now no longer holds a position on the vehicle that will carry future task orders. Its workforce is already being recruited by a company that does.
The Clause That Came Out
The solicitation for this vehicle was amended eleven times before award.
One of those amendments, filed in March, removed a federal contract clause requiring a successor contractor to offer jobs to the predecessor contractor's employees before hiring anyone new.
The same amendment added language about transition planning from government screening to contractor screening.
We are not going to characterize why. We are noting that the clause protecting screeners in a contractor-to-contractor handoff was removed five months before this vehicle was awarded.
That is a different protection from the right of first refusal that applies when a contractor replaces federal officers. It covers a different situation, and it is the one that matters when an airport changes companies.
The Sequence
May 14TSA announces Gold+.
May 29TSA awards the successor vehicle.
June 24TSA publishes the Gold+ solicitation with a twelve point nine billion dollar ceiling.
July 31Proposals close.
August 24TSA announces that an evolved Screening Partnership Program will replace Gold+.
August 25Tampa announces it will keep federal officers.
August 26Des Moines withdraws, citing TSA discontinuing the program.
August 27TSA cancels the Gold+ solicitation entirely.
Why It Matters
When TSA says an evolved Screening Partnership Program, this is what it runs on. Not a future solicitation. Not something that has to be built.
A contract vehicle that already exists, with companies already selected, running into the 2030s.
TSA's own rule is that future airport task orders go only to companies holding positions on that vehicle.
Which means the next expansion of private screening does not require a public procurement event that anyone would know to watch for. It requires a task order.
What We Do Not Know
What evolved means, and how it differs from the program that has run since 2002.
Whether the technology piece that made Gold+ distinct comes back, and through what mechanism.
What happens at Charleston, which has said nothing publicly since July 22.
What happens at Sonoma County, where the company running the checkpoint no longer holds a seat at the table.
We will keep reading the documents.
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