It looked like D.C. was about to get RFK stadium. Then Elon Musk started tweeting

For about 24 hours, D.C. was set to gain something that city officials had been requesting for years. Celebratory statements were made, local football fans imagined happier days ahead, and the possibilities seemed endless.

Elon Musk, though, felt differently.

In a daylong flurry of angry and misleading tweets on Wednesday, the multi-billionaire businessman and close ally of President-elect Donald Trump took aim at a 1,500-page federal spending bill that included a provision that would give D.C. more control over the aging and largely abandoned RFK stadium campus. It would have paved the way for new housing and commercial development and raised the prospects of the Washington Commanders returning to the city.

By late afternoon, Trump similarly weighed in against the spending bill — all but killing its chances of being considered before Congress is set to depart D.C. for the holidays. (If no spending bill is passed, the federal government will shut down over the weekend.) The path ahead for the fate of the RFK stadium site — and D.C.’s longstanding requests that it use the land for more than just a stadium and parking — is now unclear, at best.

Since at least 2017, D.C. officials have been asking Congress to give D.C. more control over the 190-acre campus, which includes the 63-year-old stadium and acres of unused parking. Under a lease agreement with the federal government, D.C. can only use the site for a stadium and recreation; city officials see significant additional potential in repurposing the land for new housing and retail, and potentially as the location for an entertainment district with a new Commanders stadium as its centerpiece.

In mid-2023 there was progress towards D.C. getting what it wanted. In a somewhat unexpected political alliance, Rep. James Comer, the Kentucky Republican who chairs the House Oversight Committee and has been sharply critical of the city’s government, introduced a bill that would extend the city’s lease for 99 years while giving it more flexibility to redevelop most of the RFK site. Earlier this week, that bill was wrapped into a much larger federal spending bill Congress had to pass before leaving town for the holidays, raising local expectations that the long sought-after goal of more local control over the land was a vote away.

“Congress is doing its job to oversee the nation’s capital,” Comer tweeted on Tuesday. “Without Congressional action, this RFK site & land would remain vacant, leaving ongoing maintenance costs & liabilities to burden the American taxpayer. Now is the time to get the federal government out of the way.” 

But that’s not exactly how Musk and some conservatives seemed to see it. On Wednesday afternoon, Musk retweeted a conservative influencer who claimed that the RFK-related provision amounted to a $3 billion taxpayer subsidy for a new Commanders stadium. “This should not be funded by your tax dollars!” opined Musk. 

Musk’s missive — one of dozens that day focusing on multiple provisions of the spending bill — was seen by 9.7 million people and retweeted more than 18,000 times. That included Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who said, “Good catch Elon. You’re doing a great job.” 

The claim Musk retweeted, though, was misleading. The bill’s provision specifically says no federal funding can be used to redevelop the RFK site, including to build a new stadium. And whether or not a stadium would be built is itself an open question. While Mayor Muriel Bowser has made no secret of her desire for the Commanders to return (and the Commanders’ owner has reciprocated), no agreement has yet been made and no financing deal — which would have to be approved by the D.C. Council — has been unveiled.

In fact, the provision doesn’t even give D.C. ownership of the RFK site but rather would extend the existing lease – which would already allow a new stadium to be built for the Commanders – and give the city additional flexibility to use the land for housing and commercial development, which is now prohibited. It’s not just D.C. that believes the RFK site is currently underutilized, either; in 2006, the National Capital Planning Commission released its own redevelopment study of the site.

“NCPC planners believe the RFK site should be an environmentally friendly gateway into the monumental core. It should include a large waterfront park, with recreational fields and open space, augmented by commemorative works and connected to the surrounding neighborhoods by pedestrian and bicycle paths. The interior of the site should include new residential and retail development,” it recommended.

The future of the RFK bill is now murky. Republican leaders in the House are scrambling to draft a new federal spending bill to keep the government open past the weekend, and it appears highly unlikely that the RFK-related provisions would be included in it. 

It also remains to be seen whether the RFK bill will be reintroduced next year as a stand-alone measure. While the House did pass it earlier this year on a bipartisan basis, 55 of the chamber’s most conservative and Trump-friendly members voted against it. Other Republicans, including Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), have similarly raised objections, arguing that D.C. should be forced to buy the RFK site. 

There is another possible option: Bowser could press the issue with Trump directly. She has already said she will be trying as much, at least when it comes to bringing federal workers back to their offices on a full-time basis and pushing the federal government to redevelop underutilized buildings in the city — or let D.C. do it instead.

“I agree with [Trump] on this point: We want to make our nation’s capital the most beautiful in the United States, so we have to move and free RFK," she said on Thursday.