FBI to move headquarters into Reagan Building, seemingly resolving decades-long fight

The FBI and General Services Administration on Tuesday announced that the law enforcement agency would move its headquarters less than half a mile to the Ronald Reagan Building from its current downtown Washington, D.C., location, which has more than $300 million in deferred maintenance costs. 

“This is a historic moment for the FBI,” Bureau Director Kash Patel said in a statement. "Through our strong partnerships with members of Congress and GSA, we are ushering FBI Headquarters into a new era and providing our agents of justice a safer place to work. Moving to the Ronald Reagan Building is the most cost effective and resource efficient way to carry out our mission to protect the American people and uphold the Constitution."

Picking the location for a new FBI headquarters has been a decades-long pursuit that seemed to reach a conclusion during President Joe Biden’s administration when GSA, in 2023, selected a site in Greenbelt, Maryland, over one in Virginia, which prompted protests from the latter’s lawmakers as well as FBI leadership, who criticized the selection process. 

President Donald Trump, however, nixed those plans. Officials on Tuesday argued that building a new suburban campus for the FBI would be too time consuming and costly. 

GSA didn't immediately respond to questions regarding the timeline for such a move or if it would displace the Reagan Building’s current tenants, which include U.S. Customs and Border Protection and Environmental Protection Agency in addition to private organizations. FBI officials said that the Bureau didn't have anything further to share at this time. 

The Reagan Building previously housed the U.S. Agency for International Development, which the Trump administration has effectively eliminated. 

Patel told Fox News in May that the FBI would leave the J. Edgar Hoover building and move 1,500 employees outside of the National Capital Region.