Unfortunately tons of US gov contracts a) are lowest bid and b) only have one applicant
A) Are you sure? In my country I see a lot that are merit based. Where the evaluation takes into account the total value provided. So for example a SaaS solution that costs 10K per month may be ranked lower than a HW based solution that costs 15K per month but provides permanent licenses and hardware.
In any case, if you can argue the lower bid doesn't or cannot comply with ANY of the requirements, you may be able to impugn their bid.
I think that you have a naive view of the level of corruption at play in this country. This is how you end up with an incompetent swimming pool contractor destroying a national monument for profit. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/company-trump-donor-cafaro-refl...