On Tuesday, US district judge Beryl Howell effectively allowed the transfer of the headquarters building of the United States Institute of Peace to the General Services Administration.
In fact, the building—and all of the property inside it—had already been transferred on Saturday, according to Howell’s ruling. “The deal is no longer merely ‘proposed’ but done,” Howell wrote, “rendering plaintiffs’ requested relief moot as to that property.”
The building, with an estimated value of $500 million, has become the latest focal point in a weeks-long standoff between former institute staff and members of Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency. On March 14, the Trump administration fired the USIP’s 10 voting board members. When USIP staffers barred DOGE employees from entering their headquarters in Washington DC, the DOGE team returned a few days later with a physical key they had gotten from a former security contractor.
The takeover was both physical and institutional. Former State Department official Kenneth Jackson was installed as USIP president, then replaced on March 25 by DOGE staffer Nate Cavanaugh, who had previously been assigned to the General Services Administration. By last Friday evening, most USIP staffers had received termination notices, effectively shuttering the agency.
The fight over the building came to light Monday, through court documents in a lawsuit filed by former USIP staffers against Cavanaugh, DOGE, Donald Trump, and other members of the administration. They reveal not only that Cavanaugh recently moved to transfer the building to GSA, but that he planned to do so at no cost to the government.
In a letter included in the court’s docket, Cavanaugh tells GSA acting administrator Stephen Ehikian that the transfer “is in the best interest of USIP, the federal government, and the United States.” In a separate letter, dated March 29, Office of Management and Budget director Russell Vought approved Ehikian’s request to “set the amount of reimbursement at no cost” for the facility.
A previously unreported court filing from Monday speaks to the Trump administration’s justification for trying to acquire the building.
“The transfer of the U.S. Institutes [sic] of Peace (USIP) headquarters facility… is a priority of the Trump-Vance administration,” wrote GSA’s Michael Peters, who spent nearly a decade running a dental practice management company before he was named Commissioner of the Public Buildings Service in January, in a transfer request form. “The transfer will enable GSA to fulfill other governmental space requirements at the USIP headquarters facility in a cost-effective manner. However, GSA has not had adequate time to budget for the cost of acquiring the USIP headquarters facility at fair market value, nor would such an acquisition be an immediate priority for GSA, given the limited resources available in the Federal Buildings Fund.”
In other words, GSA needs the office space, but can’t afford to acquire it at a fair market value. (Earlier this year, GSA targeted hundreds of government buildings to sell off, including FBI headquarters and a complex housing a CIA facility.)
While DOGE has asserted itself at dozens of federal agencies, the USIP clash is unique. The USIP is Congressionally funded, but it operates as an independent, nonexecutive agency. Government lawyers have claimed in court filings that USIP is a “wholly owned government corporation,” and that it is therefore within the GSA’s rights to transfer its property. USIP lawyers reject this claim, citing the 1984 United States Institute of Peace Act that established the agency as “an independent, nonprofit, national institute.” They also claim that the headquarters itself was “constructed with substantial private funding and private donations from its Endowment.”
Howell had previously declined a USIP request for a temporary restraining order that would have reinstated the institute’s board. Her final ruling in the case is expected to come at the end of April.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Additional reporting by Matt Giles.
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