OFCCP published three final rules on August 21, 2026. They're the finished versions of rulemaking the agency proposed on July 1, 2025 and took public comment on through that September. One rescinds the regulations that implemented Executive Order 11246. The other two revise the rules for Section 503 and VEVRAA.
Here's what the 2026 OFCCP final rules change, what they leave in place, and when each one takes effect.
| Rule | Effective |
|
Rescission of EO 11246 Implementing Regulations |
October 26, 2026 |
|
Modifications to Section 503 regulations (41 CFR 60-741) |
September 21, 2026 |
|
Modifications to VEVRAA regulations (41 CFR 60-300) |
September 21, 2026 |
President Trump revoked EO 11246 back in January 2025 with Executive Order 14173. Now, the OFCCP has officially removed the implementing regulations relating to EO 11246.
The rule eliminates:
Written affirmative action plans based on race and sex
Placement goals for nonconstruction contractors, and the female participation goal for construction
Workforce utilization analyses comparing your employees to labor pool availability
Good faith efforts obligations tied to underutilization
Before you retire any of that, though: Title VII hasn't changed. Neither have your state reporting obligations, and collecting workforce data by race and gender is still permitted or still required in some states. Talk to your legal team first.
Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 prohibits federal contractors from discriminating against people with disabilities and requires affirmative action to recruit, hire, and retain them. The new rule modifies the affirmative action requirements for individuals with disabilities. The following is no longer required for Section 503 compliance:
CC-305 form: You're no longer required to invite applicants and employees to self-identify as an individual with a disability at pre-offer, post-offer, and recurring intervals.
Utilization goal: The 7% utilization goal is gone too, so no more measuring each job group against the benchmark.
Self-identification tracking: This also means you no longer need to track the number of applicants and hires who self identify as an individual with a disability in your annual AAP.
Everything else stays: annual AAPs, nondiscrimination, reasonable accommodation, the audit and reporting system, and outreach and recruitment for individuals with disabilities.
Watch that last one. While the utilization goal existed, you had a number to point to. Now your outreach record is the evidence. What you did, who you partnered with, when you did it, and whether you can produce the paperwork.
The Vietnam Era Veterans' Readjustment Assistance Act (VEVRAA) requires federal contractors to take affirmative action to recruit, hire, promote, and retain veterans. The new rule makes two technical changes:
It pulls the enforcement procedures out of the dying EO 11246 regulations and drops them into the VEVRAA regulations.
It changes the coverage threshold from $150,000 to $200,000. This inflation adjustment has been in effect since October 1, 2025, so the rule is codifying something that already happened.
Still in place:
Mandatory job listing with the state employment delivery system
Invitation to self-identify as a protected veteran
Annual AAP for contractors with 50 or more employees and a covered contract of $200,000 or more
The annual VEVRAA hiring benchmark
Recordkeeping, two years for most contractors
Despite the new rules, job posting requirements for federal contractors remain untouched. Every covered opening must be listed with the right state employment delivery system (ESDS), with records to show for it, and you must be able to demonstrate outreach to individuals with disabilities and veterans, again, with documentation. Records still need to be available for three years.
This is the part JobTarget handles. CompliancePost imports your jobs, posts them to state job banks and to sites that reach veterans and people with disabilities, then collects image proofs and holds them for three years so they're there when a scheduling letter shows up. It runs inside whatever ATS or HRIS your team is already in, so the listing happens when you post the req instead of becoming one more thing somebody has to remember. Community outreach and manually logged activity go into the same record.
The new rules revoked some obligations for federal contractors, but they also reaffirmed the requirements that remain.