Trump Envoy Steve Witkoff, Pakistani Government Plan Roosevelt Hotel Redevelopment

The Roosevelt Hotel in Manhattan is about to get an upgrade courtesy of the Pakistani government and President Donald J. Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, real estate developer Steve Witkoff. 

The government of Islamabad announced Thursday that the Pakistani Finance Ministry has come to a nonbinding agreement with the U.S. General Services Administration to jointly redevelop the Roosevelt Hotel, a 22-story, 1,025 room hotel that opened in 1924 in the heart of Midtown Manhattan, but closed in 2020 and had been a migrant intake shelter from 2023 to 2025. 

Reuters first reported the deal. 

Pakistan International Airlines has owned the hotel since 2000, which is named after President Theodore Roosevelt (though former President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s picture appeared in the lobby, as well). 

The hotel sits on an entire city block off Madison Avenue between 44th and 45th Streets in Manhattan’s prime central business district. The New York Post speculated that the hotel’s land could be worth well over $1 billion, as the site could be redeveloped into a new office building, as other nearby office buildings include SL Green’s 1 Vanderbilt, J.P. Morgan Chase’s new $5 billion office tower at 270 Park Avenue, and BXP’s planned office at 343 Madison Avenue.

The deal is a bit of an odd one, as the U.S. General Services Administration typically handles the federal government’s commercial real estate properties, like agency headquarters in Washington, D.C., and doesn’t often partner with other states to redevelop assets owned by foreign governments such as embassies. 

Pakistan owes the International Monetary Fund $7 billion, money which could come through the ownership, redevelopment and sale of real estate assets, Reuters speculated. 

Then there’s the Witkoff angle. The famed New York real estate developer and investor has been Trump’s right-hand man for major diplomatic matters since the president began his second term in Jan. 2025, including high-profile meetings with President Vladimir Putin of Russia, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, and members of the Iranian government. 

Witkoff, who negotiated the deal with Islamabad for the Roosevelt Hotel, might have his eye on post-dipolomatic real estate deals in the city he made his name, according to the Post. Witkoff’s eponymous real estate firm, Witkoff Group, has financed the Times Square Edition and the Faena in Manhattan. 

Witkoff Group’s representatives did not respond to requests for comment.

Brian Pascus can be reached at bpascus@commercialobserver.com.