The D.C. area has one of the largest populations of Black wealth in the country due in large part to federal government employment and contracting opportunities, but some worry they’ll see those gains disappear as the region feels the impact of President Donald Trump’s cuts to agency staffing and spending. Investigative Reporter Tracee Wilkins and the News4 I-Team spoke to small business leaders about how the changes are affecting their companies and what they’re trying to do to survive.
At a gathering for Black government contractors this month in Manassas, Virginia, pleasantries quickly gave way to the heaviness of why they gathered.
Remona Antoine was among the first to share how her small consulting business has been upended since President Donald Trump took office and billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency began slashing staffing and spending.
Drip by drip, she saw more than a dozen of her leadership trainings canceled by multiple agencies. She was originally booked to lead training courses through August. Now, she said, her calendar is empty and tens of thousands of dollars she expected in income are gone.
“I felt like I was right on the cusp,” said Antoine, who entered the contracting field only a few years ago and hoped to turn a profit this year for the first time.
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Now, she isn’t sure her business will survive and is worried about what that means for her household.
“Some of our leaders may think that they're disrupting how the government has functioned, but they're disrupting homes, and they're disrupting families,” she said.
Antoine said her trainings didn’t fall under diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives the president has eliminated. Still, like other contractors who gathered at the Northern Virginia Black Chamber of Commerce, she said she feels especially vulnerable now.
“I think it's hitting communities of color and small businesses, women minority-owned businesses, because it takes us so much longer to get these contracts,” she said.
Samuel Wiggins, president of the Virginia Minority Chambers, a nonprofit that serves and advocates for minority chambers of commerce across the commonwealth, called federal contracts the “holy grail” for many contractors of color.
“Every contractor, every federal contractor -- their whole goal is to get that first government contract,” he said, explaining once a contractor develops relationships and a solid reputation, it can “lead to a whole lifetime of your business having government contracts.”
But the numbers show just how hard getting contracts can be.
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, in 2021 minority-owned businesses represented 24% of eligible businesses for federal contract awards but were only awarded 3%.
Black business owners in particular accounted for nearly 12% of eligible contract recipients but were awarded fewer than 5%.
Under President Joe Biden, the Small Business Administration worked to increase the number of federal contract dollars awarded to small, disadvantaged businesses from 5% annually to as high as 15% by 2025.
But after Trump took office, the SBA rescinded Biden’s executive orders dealing with diversity, equity and inclusion, a move that reset the contracting goal to 5%.
Wiggins said his members are concerned about those changes and whether the so-called set aside programs through the SBA will become targets as well.
“That does bring associated fear. It does feel like they're being abandoned or even targeted,” he said.
Attorney Kendra Perkins Norwood, a federal procurement attorney who represents both large and small government contractors, said federal contracts have been critical to the Black community in the D.C. region and beyond.
“Federal government contracting has been responsible for wealth generation in many communities, particularly the Black community. It has created the Black middle class, in many instances,” she said.
She argued there’s still a need for programs to help disadvantaged business owners get a seat at the federal contracting table.
“We know that minority-owned businesses don't necessarily perform financially as well as majority-owned businesses. And so, until we see that sort of equity across the board, I would say that programs like this do need to continue,” she said.
Wiggins said while the path seems more challenging than ever, he encourages business owners to stay the course and pivot as necessary.
New unemployment figures out of Virginia this week gave us a glimpse of the impact of Trump's cuts on local jobs.
More than 4,000 unemployment insurance claims were filed for the week of March 8, according to the state, which was 40% higher than the prior week and more than 80% higher than the same week in 2024.
While the numbers may include some federal contractors, it doesn't cover income lost by independent contractors like Antoine.
For now, she said she and others are exploring procurement opportunities outside of the federal space, while learning from and leaning on each other.
“I have a little bit more hope that our business may be able to partner with another business and at least sustain the business and not incur deeper losses,” she said after attending the Northern Virginia Black Chamber of Commerce event.
“But I don't know,” she added. “For how long, right? It’s just a big unknown.”
News4 photographer Jerry Lawlor contributed to this report.
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