*On April 20, 2026, JAG Marine Group provided the operator of this website with a sworn affidavit executed by Paige Henderson. The affidavit asserts that Henderson is employed by US Federal Contractor Registration, Inc., and that a “clerical error was made whereby Small Disadvantaged Business concern was incorrectly checked for JAG WFS,” and that “[a]t no time . . . did Charles Minton or another representative of JAG WFS direct me to select Small Disadvantaged Business concern.”
A copy of Ms. Henderson’s affidavit can be read here. In response to the affidavit, this page has been updated to state that JAG Welding was represented as a small disadvantaged business concern during the years in question. The operator of this website has no opinion on the veracity of Ms. Henderson’s affidavit.
**On February 9, 2026, the information in this post was communicated to several prime contractors who had previously awarded federal subcontracts to JAG Welding. Later that evening, JAG Welding updated its registration on www.sam.gov to remove the assertion it had maintained for the previous five years that it qualified as a small disadvantaged business concern.*
Between April 2021 and February 9, 2026, JAG Marine Group subsidiary JAG Welding, Fab & Services was represented to the federal government and community of federal contractors as a “small disadvantaged business concern.”
During this period, the firm was awarded more than $66 million worth of subcontracts on federal projects.
To be properly classified as an SDB, one or some combination of these shareholders must have been both (1) socially and economically disadvantaged and (2) the unconditional owners and controllers of JAG Welding.
What is a small disadvantaged business concern?
A “small disadvantaged business concern” or SDB is a federal contractor that is “owned and controlled by one or more socially and economically disadvantaged individuals.” A firm represented as an SDB gets a leg up on its competition because the federal procurement code favors contracting with SDBs. For example, in FY2025, the Trump Administration set a government-wide goal of awarding 5% of the contract value of all prime contracts to SDBs.
What are the consequences for misrepresenting SDB status?
On the other hand, a firm that is misrepresented as an SDB in order to get preferential treatment could be the subject of criminal prosecution and/or civil liability under the False Claims Act, which is a federal law used to combat fraud in federal contracting. When JAG Welding was represented to the federal government as an SDB, it was on the explicit understanding that any misrepresentations could give rise to a claim under the False Claims Act.
While many federal government priorities shifted during the 2025 calendar year, exposing fraud, waste and abuse in SDB programs has remained high on the list. In December, for example, the Small Business Administration ordered all 4,300 participants in its 8(a) Business Development Program for SDBs to resubmit basic documentation proving the legitimacy of their participation. 1,091 firms have already had their participation in the 8(a) program suspended, and high-profile prosecutions have been launched into contractors suspected of abuse.
Which (if any) of JAG Welding’s founding shareholders qualified it as an SDB?
Thomas Shoup? — Shoup may be the obvious candidate as the largest original shareholder at 40%. Shoup was recruited by Huff from another marine contractor to form JAG Welding. Unlike Huff, Jagielski and Minton, he had no prior dealings or holdings in other JAG Marine Group subsidiaries. Shoup was unique to JAG Welding, and that could explain why no other JAG Marine Group subsidiary was represented as an SDB.
There are two problems with this theory.
First, Shoup was terminated from JAG Welding by Huff and Jagielski in August 2024 after a falling out and his shares were repurchased, but the firm continued to be represented as an SDB until February 9, 2026, including in three separate filings on www.sam.gov.
Second, Shoup’s shares did not give him unconditional control over JAG Welding while he was there. After the termination, JAG Welding and Shoup sued each other over the enforcement of non-solicitation and non-compete clauses in Shoup’s employment agreement. See Shoup v. JAG Welding, Fab & Services, et al., Case No. 24-CV-1776 (S.D. Cal. 2024). During the course of litigation, Huff acknowledged that Shoup in fact reported to Jagielski, and that Shoup’s shares in JAG Welding were non-voting. Federal procurement regulations are clear that the unconditional owner and controller of a corporate SDB must possess voting shares. Huff’s affidavit in the matter is produced below.
Douglas Huff ? — A second candidate might be Huff himself, who originally owned a 27.5% shareholding in JAG Welding. Except Huff is, by all appearances, a Caucasian man of substantial means. Federal SBD regulations state that a socially disadvantaged individual is one who has “been subjected to racial or ethnic prejudice or cultural bias within American society because of their identities as members of groups and without regard to their individual qualities.” Huff is pictured below:
Huff’s reported financial holdings additionally raise questions about whether he would qualify as economically disadvantaged. An individual is economically disadvantaged under federal SDB regulations if a “socially disadvantaged individual[] whose ability to compete in the free enterprise system has been impaired due to diminished capital and credit opportunities as compared to others in the same or similar line of business who are not socially disadvantaged.” In order to qualify as economically disadvantaged, Huff’s net worth must be less than $850,000, excluding his ownership interest in JAG Welding and the equity in his primary personal residence. The fair market value of Huff’s total assets, including the ownership interest and primary residence, should generally be less than $6.5 million. And an individual is presumed not to be economically disadvantaged if their average adjusted gross income during the previous three years exceeded $400,000.
Huff and his wife own and reside in a five-bedroom, five-bathroom mansion in Milton, GA. Milton is an exurb of Atlanta and one of Georgia’s wealthiest cities. The Huff’s purchased their Milton, GA mansion in 2007 for $1.775 million. The mansion sits on 2.19 acres, and in 2025 the property was appraised by the Fulton County Assessor’s Office at a fair market value of $3.298 million, which represented a $1.083 million increase from its previous appriasal. On the basis of that appraisal, the Huffs paid over $34,000 in county property taxes alone in 2025.
They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Earlier this year, a drone operator was commissioned to take aerial photographs of the Huff’s mansion. They are shown below:
The Milton, GA mansion is not Huff’s only property. In 2006, Huff purchased a cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains for $579,000. County records currently value the 3.1 acre property at $1.652 million, which includes $1.525 million of improvement value in the form of an 8,986 square foot cabin. Satellite imagery shows the extent of improvements made to the property over the last decade.
Another indication of Huffs economic status is that since 2020, he has made over $70,000 in personal contributions to candidates for federal office and their affiliated political committees. Just in 2025, Huff and his wife gave $38,000 to political committees associated with Alaska Senator Dan Sullivan.
There is also Huff’s interests in JAG Marine Group’s four subsidiaries, which in addition to JAG Welding include JAG Industrial Services, Inc., JAG Alaska, Inc. and JAG Ketchikan LLC. Huff serves as the President/Manager of each of these subsidiaries, and owns 60% of JAG Industrial Services, 60% of JAG Ketchikan and 37.71% of JAG Alaska, Inc. Together, between January 1, 2020 and the present, these subsidiaries have received over $345 million in federal government contracts, through both direct awards and subcontracts. This figure does not include the value of any private commercial work the subsidiaries received during these years.
Tim Jagielski or Charles Minton? — The remaining candidates are Jagielski and Minton, but at 27.5% and 5% initial shareholdings respectively, these two’s shares in JAG Welding at its founding were simply too small to qualify them as its unconditional owners.
JAG Welding’s annual SDB representations between April 2021 and February 2026 were attested to by Paige Henderson (see ** above), on the explicit understanding that any misrepresentations could be the subject of criminal prosecution and/or civil liability under the False Claims Act. On February 9, 2026, officer/employee Charles Minton updated JAG Welding’s registration with www.sam.gov to attest that it is in fact not an SDB.
***The information in this post is drawn entirely from publicly available or accessible sources, such as www.sam.gov; Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER); various state corporate filing databases; various Georgia county property and tax record databases; the Federal Election Commission’s individual contribution database; and the blue skies above us.***