Just as Donald Trump is set to retake the White House next month, his former Washington D.C. hotel could be resurrected as Trump International Hotel, according to the New York Post.
Trump, who sold his lease two years ago for a reported $375 million, is said to be exploring scenarios that involve the Trump Organization either buying back the lease for the historic hotel — housed in the U.S. Capitol’s Old Post Office, which is owned by the federal government — or a possible licensing deal, sources told the Post.
“Our family has saved the hotel once,” Eric Trump, the company’s executive vice president, told the Post on Friday. “If asked, we would save it again.”
The shuttered Trump International Hotel has since been turned into a Hilton-managed Waldorf-Astoria but is reportedly declining. Trump stirred controversy when he opened the hotel weeks before the 2016 election before it quickly became a gathering place for Republican lobbyists and foreign leaders visiting the president.
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Republican operatives shelled out $266,000 at the hotel in its first six months alone, the Post reported, citing FEC data.
Still, he lost money on the project, and he reportedly continued to lose money on it even after unloading the lease.
“It is still ‘to be determined’ whether the Trump Organization would want to wrestle back full control of the hotel by buying back the lease it sold in 2022 or agree to a licensing deal,” a source told the Post. “Sources close to the property said the president-elect is eyeing a possible hospitality investment in the DC area," the Post said.
The publication added that “there had been no formal outreach from the Trump Organization about the Waldorf Astoria.
News that the Trump Organization is considering the hotel venture came days after Eric Trump took to social media to announce a new Trump Organization project in Saudi Arabia: Trump Tower Jeddah.
