DHS excludes DeepSeek from federal civilian procurement and IT
Department of Homeland Security. October 26, 2026. Read the source.
What does the DHS DeepSeek exclusion order mean for organizations with federal funding?
On October 20, 2026, the Department of Homeland Security published an order from the Secretary of Homeland Security under the Federal Acquisition Supply Chain Security Act. It excludes information technology products and services developed by Hangzhou DeepSeek Artificial Intelligence Co., Ltd and its affiliates from federal civilian agency procurements, and it removes DeepSeek products, affiliate products, and third-party products built on DeepSeek implementations from civilian agency information technology. The order binds federal civilian agencies and their procurements; an organization that sells IT to those agencies, or builds tools for them under a federal award, should check what its products are built on.
What the order does
The order has two parts. First, it excludes DeepSeek-developed IT products and services, including affiliated entities as defined in federal acquisition regulations, from federal civilian agency procurements. Second, it removes all DeepSeek and DeepSeek-affiliate products, and any third-party products and services developed using DeepSeek implementations, from civilian agency information technology.
The authority is the Federal Acquisition Supply Chain Security Act of 2018 and its implementing regulations, following a recommendation of the Federal Acquisition Security Council. The signed order sits on regulations.gov under docket DHS-2026-0628.
Who it reaches
The order is written for federal civilian executive branch agencies: what they may buy and what may run on their systems. It is not a rule for grant recipients as such. It reaches an organization in two ways. One is anything it sells or delivers to a civilian agency. The other is any product it builds under federal funding that is meant to run on agency systems. The phrase to read twice is third-party products developed using DeepSeek implementations. That covers tools built on top of those models as well as the models themselves.
A research office, a contractor, or a nonprofit delivering software to an agency should be able to name the models its tools are built on. Where an open-weight model with DeepSeek origins sits in the stack, that is the item to raise with the contracting officer or program officer before the next deliverable.
The wider pattern for applicants
Funders are writing their own rules about AI in proposals and in funded work, and the rules differ by agency. Where funders stand on AI keeps the current positions in one place. Quillify drafts from your organization’s own documents and tells you which model providers process them, so the answer to a funder’s question is one you can give.
What you can do today
- Where funders stand on AI
- Search open government contracts and grants
- Quillify for government contractors
More policy news: NIH webinar notices, October 26 to 28, 2026. The 2026 proposal to trim HHS block grant regulations. The 2026 final rule trimming child support program regulations. USDA SPUR guaranteed loans for FY 2027: who qualifies and how to apply. SBA surety bond guarantee fees: what changes on November 30, 2026.
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