# Federal Agencies Award XpresTest Health Response Work

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention awarded XpresTest, a subsidiary of XWELL, $18.8 million for Ebola screening at U.S. airports, and the State Department awarded it $20 million for infectious-disease response in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, for a reported total of $38.8 million. Reporting says federal contract data characterized the CDC award as urgent and sole-source with one bid, while XWELL’s CEO described the award as competitively bid. The reports also question XpresTest’s documented Ebola and overseas biosecurity experience and describe an investment connection involving a fund linked to Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump; the available evidence cited does not establish interference in the awards.

- Procurement teams can use these awards as a prompt to examine how relevant outbreak-response experience, technical capability, and performance risk are documented and evaluated for similar work.
- The conflicting accounts of the CDC competition warrant attention to the award’s stated procurement basis, urgency rationale, and bid history when assessing the procurement record.
- Companies pursuing airport screening or international public-health response work should be prepared to substantiate relevant experience and delivery capacity. The signals identify no new solicitation or proposal deadline.

**Jurisdictions:** federal
**Industries:** Healthcare, Public Safety
**Topics:** Emergency Response, Grants & Funding
**Published:** November 11, 2026

### Government Entities
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
- U.S. Department of State (State Department)

### Vendors
- XpresTest (Awardee of CDC and State Department awards)
- XWELL (Parent company of awardee)

### Key Quotes
> This is a risky contract. I’m not sure we can do it.
> — Ezra Ernst, Chief Executive Officer of XWELL

> There are countless organizations in the world that have decades of experience doing this work.
> — Jeremy Konyndyk, former official involved in overseeing the U.S. response to the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa

### Sources
- [Company That Never Worked on Ebola Won $18.8 Million CDC Contract to Screen Travelers at U.S. Airports](https://www.medicaldaily.com/xprestest-ebola-screening-cdc-contract-airports-481118) - Medical Daily
- [Firm Linked to Trump’s Sons Got Nearly $40 Million in Federal Contracts to Screen for Ebola and Other Diseases https://t.co/1KXbbW58zS #USDemocracy #DemsUnited #DemVoice1

Last year Elon Musk’s DOGE decimated USAID and their disease prevention and eradication programs in Africa. ](https://x.com/RealMartyT7/status/2119956971780505763) - twitter-fed-procurement
- [Trump Administration Awards $40m Contracts To Company Backed By Fund Linked To President Trump’s Sons | Sahara Reporters](https://saharareporters.com/2026/11/09/trump-administration-awards-40m-contracts-company-backed-fund-linked-president-trumps) - Sahara Reporters