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In December 2014, Congress gave government chief information officers (CIOs) new powers and authority to manage the IT enterprise at their departments and component agencies under the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA). Three and a half years later, CIOs don’t have the authority they need, administration officials said. President Trump signed an executive order giving presidential weight to mandates of FITARA, specifically the parts that give department CIOs authority over hiring, budgets and setting the IT agenda for the entire department enterprise.

The global internet is a lot less global than it was a few years ago. The US government, which used to be the loudest advocate for knocking down digital barriers, has begun to erect barriers of its own since the 2016 election and the Russian hacking and influence operation that upended it. US officials and lawmakers once merely condemned Russian and Chinese laws that forced tech companies to share their source code or to store citizens’ data within national borders.