Rubio and Hegseth Live Two Doors Apart at Fort McNair

Featured image: Aerial view of Fort Lesley J. McNair in Washington, D.C., looking north, with Roosevelt Hall and the National Defense University at center, Dec. 14, 2016 (file photo). The photograph shows the Army post, not the private residence of any official. Photo: Mike Vaccaro, U.S. Army, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Baltimore District (original, unedited file), also on Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth live two doors apart at Fort McNair in Washington, D.C., according to Rubio and to earlier reporting by The Atlantic. They are among senior Trump administration officials who have moved into military housing amid security threats.

The latest is Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who The New York Times, NBC News and other outlets reported this week had relocated to a military base after Iranian threats. Officials have not said which base. The Boston Report reported the move on Wednesday. As of Thursday afternoon, Nov. 12, 2026, Eastern Time, that broader pattern, and not only Bessent’s relocation, is the public record reviewed here.

Key points drawn from the State Department transcript of Rubio’s Aug. 11, 2026, interview; NBC News and USA Today on Bessent; The Atlantic and a White House announcement on Miller; and the Department of Homeland Security’s list of secretaries, plus Reuters and Politico on Bondi’s removal.

Bessent’s move, and what remains unconfirmed

The New York Times first reported that Bessent had left his Washington home for a U.S. military base after threats from Iran, a move Reuters, NBC News, USA Today, BBC News and Fox News also reported on Nov. 11 and 12. The Times reported that the severity of the threats was not immediately clear. A Treasury Department spokesperson said Bessent “will not be deterred by the Iranian regime’s threats and remains committed to executing Operation Economic Outcast and maintaining the blockade, which together are collapsing Iran’s economy.” Treasury has not described the threats in public.

A source familiar with the matter told NBC News that security concerns increased after The Wall Street Journal published a photograph that allowed Bessent’s Washington residence to be geolocated, and that those concerns “forced the Secretary to relocate to a military base for his safety.” The source also said, “The news media has an obligation to act responsibly amid growing threats against public officials.” NBC News reported that Dow Jones, the Journal’s parent company, declined to comment. USA Today reported that officials have not disclosed which base he moved to. This article does not repeat details of that private residence.

A senior official told Fox News the threats against Bessent had reached “more than an advanced stage.” That characterization has not been independently documented in the other accounts reviewed here, and it sits beside the Times’s report that the severity was unclear. The Independent, recounting the Times report, said Iran has previously denied plotting to attack officials and people on U.S. soil. That is Iran’s denial, not a finding by The Boston Report.

Bessent has led the administration’s economic pressure campaign against Iran, called Operation Economic Outcast, since August, according to Treasury’s statement and to reporting by NBC News and The Independent. The Independent said the campaign runs alongside a U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports and is intended to push Tehran to end attacks on shipping and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, which has been largely closed since the United States and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28, starting the Iran war.

Rubio and Hegseth on Generals’ Row

Fort McNair, an Army installation in Southwest Washington at the confluence of the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers, is the post most clearly identified in the reporting. It is home to the National Defense University and has traditionally provided quarters for senior military officers, not for a large group of civilian political appointees.

The Atlantic reported on Oct. 30, 2025, that Rubio and Hegseth both live on “Generals’ Row” at Fort McNair, citing officials at the State and Defense Departments. Axios, summarizing that report the same day, also placed the two men on Generals’ Row, near Buzzard Point. The New York Times published a separate account the same day describing officials taking up military residences in the Washington area, including Rubio and Hegseth at the post.

Rubio later described the arrangement in his own words. In an Aug. 11, 2026, interview with Katie Miller, released as an official State Department transcript, he said: “We rent a military house, so our neighbors are busy all day. They’re generals or people in the military, except for two doors down, Pete lives in the neighborhood so I see them sometimes.” USA Today, in its Nov. 11 report on Bessent, also noted that Rubio had previously described the two as neighbors during a podcast appearance.

In March, The Washington Post reported that U.S. officials had detected unidentified drones above the Washington Army base where Rubio and Hegseth live, according to three people, and that the sightings raised security concerns during the war with Iran. Daily Mail, recounting that Post report, said officials had considered whether to relocate the two men and that, as of that mid-March account, they had not moved. Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell, the Post and Daily Mail reported, declined to discuss the secretary’s movements.

Miller’s move came in 2025; his title has since changed

Stephen Miller moved into military housing in September 2025, The Atlantic reported, after protests and other incidents near the family’s home in Arlington, Virginia. At the time he was White House deputy chief of staff. Axios and ARLnow, a local Arlington news site, also reported the relocation that October, citing The Atlantic. The original Atlantic and Times reports, Snopes noted in a Nov. 3, 2025, review, did not identify which base the Millers had moved to.

Vanity Fair, in an Oct. 8, 2026, article, later wrote that the Millers live on a military post south of the White House and that their neighbors include Rubio and Hegseth, whom other outlets have placed at Fort McNair. That is the most specific later account reviewed here of Miller’s location. It does not name the post in so many words, and it should be read as reporting, not as an official confirmation of an address. This article does not describe any private street or quarter number.

Miller’s title is now different from the one he held when he moved. On Nov. 6, 2026, the White House announced that President Donald Trump had named him the 33rd White House chief of staff, succeeding Susie Wiles. NBC News, describing the earlier housing reports this week, referred to him as “now-chief of staff Stephen Miller.”

Former Cabinet officials, and others still in office

Not every official named in this week’s roundups still holds the job cited in older stories, and not all of them have been placed at Fort McNair.

Pam Bondi is a former attorney general. Reuters reported on April 2, 2026, that Trump said he had removed her and had appointed Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche in an acting capacity. Politico, in June, described Bondi as the former attorney general and said Trump had announced his intent to nominate Blanche to the post. A White House release dated Nov. 8 referred to Blanche as attorney general. The New York Times reported in March, while Bondi still held the job, that she had relocated from a Washington apartment to military housing after law enforcement flagged threats tied to drug cartels. Fox News, recounting that Times report this week, said the Times also cited backlash over her handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files and that the Justice Department disputed that explanation. Later accounts, including USA Today’s on Nov. 11, described her military-housing stay in the past tense. Her base was not identified in the reports reviewed here, and it is not clear from those accounts whether she still lives in military housing.

Kristi Noem is a former secretary of homeland security. The Department of Homeland Security’s official list of secretaries shows her tenure as Jan. 25, 2025, through March 24, 2026, and lists Markwayne Mullin as her successor from March 24. The Atlantic reported that, while she was secretary, she moved out of a District of Columbia apartment and into housing at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling after the Daily Mail described where she had been living. The Atlantic said the house was the one designated for the Coast Guard commandant. A DHS spokeswoman, Tricia McLaughlin, told Snopes the arrangement was not the “commandant’s home” but a “Coast Guard government representation facility,” that Noem was “paying fair market value for her temporary use of the facility,” and that she faced “heightened security threats following the publication of her apartment by a tabloid.” USA Today reported that she lived at the joint base toward the end of her tenure. This article does not repeat the Daily Mail’s description of her private residence, and it does not treat her as still living on that base.

Blanche himself is now part of the same reporting. On Thursday, Fox News, citing three sources familiar with the arrangement, reported that the attorney general has been living at a military installation in the Washington area for months. A source did not elaborate on the reason for a move earlier this year, Fox News said, and the network said it had sought comment from the Justice Department. The report did not name the base.

The earlier 2025 accounts named other officials as well. The Atlantic and Axios reported that Army Secretary Dan Driscoll lives at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall in Arlington and shares a home there. Snopes, summarizing the Times report, said Navy Secretary John Phelan lived at the same installation and had moved in after a fire damaged his home; CBS News had reported the fire in May 2025. The Atlantic, as recounted by Axios and Snopes, also said that a team for then-Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard had inquired about Fort McNair but that a move did not take place because of a lack of space. BBC News, in its Bessent story, listed Gabbard among former officials who had lived on military bases; that is not what The Atlantic reported, and this article does not treat Gabbard as having made the move.

By the numbers: a longer list than last year’s count

The Atlantic wrote in October 2025 that, by its count, at least six senior political appointees were living in Washington-area military housing, a number the magazine said was straining housing usually reserved for senior uniformed officers. Axios, citing that report, called it unusual, though not unheard of, for some national-security officials to live on a base, and “unprecedented to see so many doing it at once.”

The publicly reported list is longer now, though it is not an official census and should not be read as one. By The Boston Report’s count of names in the outlets cited above, current officials who have been reported as living in military housing as of this week are Rubio, Hegseth, Miller, Bessent, Blanche, Driscoll and Phelan — seven people, two of them (Bessent and Blanche) added in this week’s reporting. Bondi and Noem were reported in military housing while they still held Cabinet posts. Only Rubio and Hegseth have been firmly placed at Fort McNair by multiple accounts and by Rubio himself. Miller’s later placement there rests on Vanity Fair’s description of his neighbors. Bessent’s and Blanche’s bases have not been identified. Noem was reported at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling, and Driscoll and Phelan at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall.

Fox News, citing a 2020 National Capital Planning Commission report and a 2024 Army filing, said Fort McNair’s residential quarters are divided into two housing groups and that the filing identified 27 historic homes built before 1919 at the installation. The same report said the Army’s housing website lists 88 historic dwelling units across Fort McNair and nearby Fort Myer combined, without breaking out how many sit at each post. Those figures describe the historic housing stock, not how many units political appointees now occupy.

Reporting on the arrangements has also said that officials pay rent. Vanity Fair, citing The New York Times, wrote that officials pay a “fair market rate.” DHS, in the Snopes account, said Noem paid fair-market value for the Coast Guard facility. This article does not publish any person’s rent, home price or street address.

The pattern is not limited to Iranian threats, and it did not begin this week. Miller’s 2025 move was reported in connection with protests and security incidents near a private home, before the war with Iran began, as BBC News noted this week. Bondi’s reported relocation was tied, in the Times account, to other threats. Bessent’s move is the one this week’s reporting links to Iran. What the sources do not show is a single official roster, a confirmed base for every name, or a public finding that all of the officials listed still live where they were first reported. The record as of Thursday afternoon, Nov. 12, 2026, Eastern Time, is narrower and more uneven than a simple list of six people at Fort McNair.

Sources

• U.S. Department of State transcript: Secretary of State Marco Rubio with Katie Miller, Aug. 11, 2026
• The Atlantic: Top Trump Officials Are Moving Onto Military Bases (Oct. 30, 2025)
• Axios: Trump officials move to D.C. military housing due to safety concerns (Oct. 30, 2025)
• The New York Times: Trump Officials Move Into Military Residences in D.C. Area (Oct. 30, 2025)
• Snopes: Inspecting rumor Trump officials are moving to military bases for security reasons (Nov. 3, 2025)
• NBC News: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent moves to a military base amid Iranian threats (Nov. 12, 2026)
• USA Today: Why Bessent and other Trump officials live on military bases (Nov. 11, 2026)
• BBC News: U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent relocated after alleged Iranian threats (Nov. 11, 2026)
• The Independent, citing The New York Times and Reuters reporting on Bessent’s relocation (Nov. 11, 2026)
• Fox News: Bessent moved to military base as Iran threats exceed “advanced stage,” official says (Nov. 11, 2026)
• Fox News: Attorney General Todd Blanche reported living on a military installation (Nov. 12, 2026)
• The Washington Post: Drones over base where Rubio, Hegseth live raise security concerns (March 18, 2026)
• The White House: President Trump names Stephen Miller as 33rd White House chief of staff (Nov. 6, 2026)
• U.S. Department of Homeland Security: Secretaries of Homeland Security (Noem tenure and Mullin succession)
• Reuters: Trump says he fired Bondi, appoints Blanche as acting U.S. attorney general (April 2, 2026)
• Politico: Bondi, described as former attorney general, and Blanche’s nomination (June 4, 2026)
• Vanity Fair: account of the Millers’ military-post residence and neighbors (Oct. 8, 2026)
• ARLnow: Miller family moved from an Arlington home to military housing (Oct. 30, 2025)