Federal agencies must explain why they rejected your small-business grant
H.R. 10343 — CLEAR Feedback Act · Filed by Analilia Mejia (D-NJ) · Introduced Sep 10, 2026 · Referred to committee
Your members of Congress
Enter a ZIP to see where your representative and both senators stood on this bill.
Looked up on this device — your ZIP is never stored on our servers.
What it does
This bill requires federal agencies to give small businesses more detailed feedback when their proposals for SBIR (Small Business Innovation Research) or STTR (Small Business Technology Transfer) grants are rejected. If a small business asks within 14 days of denial, the agency must explain what was wrong with the proposal, how it ranked against others, and why it was denied—then answer follow-up questions within set timeframes. Small businesses gain transparency about why they lost funding; agencies gain a structured process for providing that feedback.
Why we flagged it
The bill's sole operative mechanism is a procedural requirement that federal agencies provide structured, timely feedback to rejected SBIR/STTR applicants. It is a transparency and accountability measure, not a subsidy, carve-out, or deregulation.
What the text implies
- Agencies may face increased administrative burden responding to debriefing requests, potentially slowing other grant-administration functions unless staffing is increased.
- The 14-day and 7-day response windows are tight; agencies with high proposal volumes may struggle to meet deadlines without additional resources.
- Enhanced transparency may reveal inconsistencies or bias in scoring across proposals, creating pressure for agencies to standardize evaluation criteria more rigorously.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
Small businesses and entrepreneurs gain concrete transparency into federal funding decisions, enabling them to improve future proposals and understand how their tax dollars are allocated. The bill imposes no new costs on citizens and strengthens accountability of federal agencies in a competitive grant process.
Named in the bill
Small Business Administration (SBA), Federal agencies (SBIR/STTR administrators), Small business concerns, Small Business Act § 9(g) and § 9(o)
Where it stands
- Sep 10, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Sep 10, 2026 — Referred to House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology and House Committee on Small Business · Congress.gov: “Referred to the Committee on Small Business, and in addition to the Committee on Science, Space, and…”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (2,588 characters) on Sep 21, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 14,522 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
As of — page rendered 2026-09-21.
“Federal agencies must explain why they rejected your small-business grant” QuorumCivic. https://share.quorumcivic.app/bill/119/hr10343 Report an error