The federal agency that manages the Voice of America media network says it’s canceling its large new office lease in Washington, D.C., as the White House looks to reduce the size of the U.S. government and its office footprint.
The U.S. Agency for Global Media, or USAGM, and Kari Lake, a former political candidate who serves as a senior adviser to the agency, said the group is ending the 15-year lease it signed in the fall to fully occupy a 13-story office tower at 1875 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. The more than 280,000-square-foot office building is owned by EastBanc, according to CoStar data.
Lake called the lease into question last week after she said President Donald Trump had issued an order affecting USAGM and Voice of America, or VOA. Over the weekend, VOA Director Michael Abramowitz said in a LinkedIn post that virtually the outlet's entire staff of more than 1,300 journalists, producers and support employees had been placed on administrative leave.
USAGM did not immediately respond to an email or phone request for comment to confirm the status of a lease cancellation and get other details of the cancellation. A representative for EastBanc declined to comment.
The move comes as the Trump administration works to shrink staff and reduce federal spending. The government's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, led by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, is reviewing leases signed by the General Services Administration, or GSA, to find avenues to save money.
"The government was spending a quarter billion dollars of your taxpayer money per year on an empty building!" Musk said about USAGM's lease in a post on X, a social network he controls. The annual dollar figure he cited could not be immediately confirmed.
A CoStar analysis suggests the new administration's possible targets for lease terminations could put more than 200 buildings at risk of financial distress, even if the cuts would be too geographically broad to produce a meaningful change in vacancy in most of the markets where the affected buildings are located.
Cancellations impact market
That appeared to be the case for the cancellation of this one lease, according to CoStar market analyst Melina Duggal.
"Given there are over 95 million square feet of available space in the [central business district's] office submarket, an additional 280,000 square feet of space on the market will have a negligible impact on the numbers overall," Duggal wrote. "However, it will have a very negative impact on the building itself, and every lease that is canceled has the potential to adversely impact the psyche of the market."
Lake argued the cancellation of USAGM's lease would benefit taxpayers.
“I am working to make sure that we are not being bilked out of our hard-earned dollars and we’re going to make sure we’re doing everything we can to cancel contracts that can be canceled, save money, downsize and make sure there’s no misuse of your dollars,” Lake said in a video posted on X.
The agency "will continue to deliver on all statutory programs that fall under the agency’s purview and shed everything that is not statutorily required," Lake said.
USAGM moved into a small space at 1875 Pennsylvania Ave. in December and had been scheduled to occupy large sections of its planned headquarters space next month, according to CoStar data.
The agency said in the fall that its relocation from the Wilbur J. Cohen Building would have occurred in phases over the next several years and would have saved taxpayers more than $150 million over the course of the lease term. Early this year, then-President Joe Biden signed an order from Congress to sell the Cohen building at 330 Independence Ave. SW. A March 2024 report by the Public Buildings Reform Board found utilization of the building between January and September 2023 was roughly 2%, CoStar reported.
Preparing for Voice of America's arrival, EastBanc put in $27 million toward the construction of studio space at 1875 Penn, NPR reported.
Other real estate moves are likely to be coming. When the White House ordered cuts to functions and staff at VOA, it also announced plans for reductions at federal agencies including the Minority Business Development Agency, the United States Interagency Council on Homelessness, the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in the Smithsonian Institution, the Institute of Museum and Library Services and the Community Development Financial Institutions Fund.
CoStar News reached out to each of the groups via email or their websites, but the status of any real estate spaces they have occupied remains unclear.
The Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service said via email it was “actively reviewing” implications of the White House order.
Also last week, Trump doubled down on his position that the headquarters of the Federal Bureau of Investigation should remain in Washington and not relocate to Maryland.
Meanwhile, The Associated Press reported last week that several other federal agencies will be terminating hundreds of leases for offices and buildings across the country in the coming months, meaning those groups would have to either negotiate new leases or move elsewhere if they stay open. The GSA is notifying landlords of those pending actions, the AP said.
For example, the news outlet reported that cancellations are expected June 30 for more than 22,000 square feet occupied by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service in Amherst, Massachusetts, and nearly 45,000 square feet by the department’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service in Boise, Idaho. The AP cited square footage matching that of DOGE’s website.