Press Releases

Today, Rep. Gerald E. Connolly, Ranking Member of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, sent a letter to General Services Administration (GSA) Acting Administrator Stephen Ehikian demanding information and documents related to GSA’s reported plans to award a contract for a $25 million pilot program to Ramp, a company with zero federal contracting experience that is backed by prominent Trump supporters, Trump family connections, and allies of Elon Musk.  This pilot program is one of multiple contracts that make up GSA’s SmartPay program, which provides Visa and Mastercard expense cards to government employees, ensuring they have the resources to provide critical services to the American people, and is anticipated to process $700 billion in payments over the life of the program.  The decision to award the contract to Ramp circumvents protocols that call for a sufficiently stringent public bidding process, raising concerns of pay-to-play. 

 “According to recent reporting, the corporate credit card and artificial intelligence software company Ramp has met frequently with high-level GSA officials over the last several weeks and appears to have begun preparing to process government payments before GSA even announced the pilot program.  Ramp’s investors include venture capital firms with ties to many prominent Trump-connected individuals, including Silicon Valley billionaire Peter Thiel, Jared Kushner’s brother Joshua Kushner, and allies of Elon Musk.  One of Ramp’s earliest investors, Keith Rabois, raised more than $1 million for Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign.  Mr. Rabois has since indicated that he does not need to join the Trump Administration because he can influence it from the outside, saying that he ‘can spoon-feed [ideas] to the right people.’  To understand the process through which GSA is selecting a contractor for the SmartPay pilot program, I request information and documents related to any bids that Ramp has submitted to GSA and recent meetings between Ramp and senior GSA officials,” wrote Ranking Member Connolly.

In his letter, Ranking Member Connolly notes that Ramp does not have any federal contracting experience.  Despite this lack of experience, executives from the company have met with Trump appointees at GSA at least four times.  According to a senior GSA official, the focus on Ramp is unusual and suspicious because “[y]ou don’t want to give this impression that leadership has already decided the winner somehow.”

To understand the extent to which Ramp may have received preferential treatment from GSA in connection with the SmartPay contract, Ranking Member Connolly requested documentation and answers to his inquiries no later than May 23, 2025. 

Click here to read the letter to Acting Administrator Stephen Ehikian.