A federal watchdog found flaws with the process for picking a site for a new FBI headquarters, but did not recommend overturning the decision to place it in Prince George’s County.

Maryland politicians had a positive take on a report issued Monday from the U.S. General Service Administration’s inspector general, noting that it should not upend the selection of Greenbelt.

“The report that the Inspector General for the General Services Administration released today confirms what Team Maryland has always said: there was no conflict of interest in the selection of Greenbelt,” read a joint statement from Gov. Wes Moore; U.S. Sens. Chris Van Hollen and Angela Alsobrooks; and U.S. Reps. Steny Hoyer and Glenn Ivey.

They added: “Nothing in this report disputes the GSA’s selection of Greenbelt as the future home of the FBI. We look forward to welcoming the FBI to Maryland and moving this project forward.”

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The FBI headquarters has been a matter of national and regional political football for more than a decade, with some arguing for the bureau to stay in D.C., and others promoting a move to either Virginia or Maryland. The project has the potential to bring thousands of jobs and spur economic growth.

During President Donald Trump’s first term, he put the issue on hold, preferring to keep the bureau in its aging home in the J. Edgar Hoover Building in the District.

For more than a decade, the federal government has been engaged in an on-again, off-again process to relocate the FBI, currently housed at the J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington, D.C. (Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)

The site selection process was resurrected by Congressional action in 2022, which culminated in a 2023 decision by the U.S. General Services Administration to place a future headquarters in Greenbelt.

Virginia politicians cried foul, questioning an adjustment that the General Services Administration made in how it weighted the selection criteria. They also called out a top GSA official for having a potential conflict of interest.

They succeeded in convincing the GSA’s inspector general to investigate.

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That investigation led to Monday’s report, which found insufficient justification for GSA to tweak the weighting of project cost as one of the selection criteria.

It also found some inaccurate and incomplete information was considered in making the decision; and that officials did not retain text messages on personal phones that discussed the process.

The report found no ethical problems with a top GSA official in the process, who had previously worked for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority. The Greenbelt site is on property owned by WMATA and the state of Maryland, adjacent to the Greenbelt Metro Station.

It’s not clear whether the inspector general report will put the matter of the future FBI headquarters to rest.

Trump wrote on his Truth Social account last year: “The new FBI building should be built in Washington, D.C., not Maryland.” He has not, however, weighed in on the matter since his inauguration last month.