The US government has a landlord, and Trump isn’t a fan
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Shortly before he was elected president in 2016, Donald Trump took a break from campaigning to attend a ceremony for his new flagship hotel, the Trump International Hotel Washington, D.C. The General Services Administration, the federal agency that owns, manages and leases much of the government’s real estate, had previously awarded Trump the rights to redevelop the government-owned Old Post Office as a luxury hotel.
The GSA selected him over Hilton, Marriott International and other big-name operators. Just before cutting the ribbon on the hotel’s opening day, Trump took a moment to praise the agency. “The GSA people are amazing professionals," he said.
Since then, Trump has soured on the GSA. That change of heart could soon accelerate a shake-up already under way in the federal government’s real-estate portfolio. The GSA manages a massive portfolio of federal buildings, consisting of 370 million square feet nationwide.
But many have been poorly maintained due to lack of funding, and are sitting empty or underused, the GSA testified before Congress in 2023. The Trump administration is considering selling two-thirds of the federal government’s office stock to the private sector, according to people familiar with the transition operations. About three-quarters of the 70 million square feet of office space the GSA leases from private landlords in D.C.
is also likely to be canceled, according to Don Peebles, a longtime Washington, D.C.-based developer. A sharp rise in GSA canceled leases would pressure D.C. landlords, many of which count on the GSA as an anchor tenant.
Read more on livemint.com
