news

Ten Democratic House lawmakers representing D.C., Maryland and Virginia called on the Justice Department's inspector general Friday to look into the circumstances that led the FBI to recommend its headquarters remain in the District rather than be moved to a suburban location and what role the Trump administration played in that about-face.

The lawmakers, including House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Md. and Elijah Cummings, D-Md., ranking member of the House Oversight and Government Reform committee, said in their letter to Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz that "Congress and the public must be reassured that such a dramatic shift in direction for this project is based on full and accurate information rather than simply to benefit the President's financial interest."

The request picked up on a similar call from Senate Democrats seeking to know what went on behind the scenes from July 2017, when the FBI and General Services Administration cancelled their search for a new FBI headquarters in suburban Maryland or Northern Virginia, and February 2018, when the FBI announced its preference for a smaller FBI headquarters on the site of the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover building at 935 Pennsylvania Ave. NW in downtown D.C.

An earlier investigation by the GSA's Inspector General revealed Trump officials were involved in discussions about the project before the February announcement, fueling speculation that Trump's intervention was at least partially financially motivated rather than purely out of the best interests of the FBI. Several lawmakers have suggested Trump hoped to avoid the Hoover site being developed into a hotel that could compete with the Trump International Hotel, Washington, D.C., located a short distance away. The report by the GSA's Inspector General only focused on the period after the GSA received word that the FBI's preference was to maintain a headquarters location in downtown D.C.

"It is incredibly alarming that the revised plan suddenly proposed keeping the new FBI headquarters at the Pennsylvania Avenue location when the FBI and GSA had consistently stated that the Hoover building was not adequate to meet the FBI's security and operational needs," the lawmakers wrote.

The lawmakers asked Horowitz to investigate whether the FBI made the decision to abandon the suburban campus option, participated in discussions but did not make the ultimate call, or whether the FBI simply acted on direction from President Donald Trump, another White House official or someone from the administration's Office of Management and Budget.

They also want to know why certain costs were withheld from a report that concluded building a new FBI headquarters on the Hoover site would cost less than shifting the agency to Maryland or Virginia. The GSA estimated the Hoover option would cost $3.3 billion, compared to $3.57 billion for the suburban consolidation, but the lawmakers pointed out that those estimates did not include about $516 million in employee relocation and facility costs associated with moving about 2,300 employees to FBI offices outside of the District.

Other members who signed the letter were Gerry Connolly and Don Beyer Jr. of Virginia; Eleanor Holmes Norton of D.C.; and Dutch Ruppersberger, John Delaney, John Sarbanes, Anthony Brown and Jamie Raskin of Maryland. The letter was not signed by Republicans Reps. Barbara Comstock, Rob Wittman nor Thomas Garrett.