The Washington Commanders have picked the construction team that will build their new $3.8 billion stadium on the former RFK Stadium site in Washington, D.C., the team announced Aug. 11, tapping a joint venture of three firms with a combined rΓ©sumΓ© that includes some of the NFL’s newest venues.
The joint venture β branded Clark | Mortenson | SmootDC β pairs Clark Construction Group and Mortenson, two national builders with extensive stadium experience, with Smoot Construction Company of Washington, D.C., a Black-owned firm that has operated in the region for nearly 60 years. The team was selected to serve as construction manager for the roughly 65,000-seat, enclosed stadium planned for the 180-acre RFK campus along the Anacostia River.
“We are confident this partnership will help us create a premier destination that serves our fans, drives economic opportunity, and leaves a lasting legacy for generations to come,” Matt Haas, the Commanders’ head of construction, said in the team’s announcement.
Smoot Construction CEO Mark S. Cain called the selection a milestone for his firm. “After almost 60 years as your hometown builder, our pride and excitement in the new Commanders Stadium is beyond measure,” Cain said. Clark Group CEO Lee DeLong and Mortenson vice president and general manager Logan Gerken were also quoted in the release touting the venture’s track record.
That track record is substantial. Clark, Mortenson and Smoot have separately worked on Nationals Park in Washington, Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas β home of the Raiders β and U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, home of the Vikings, according to the Commanders’ announcement. The team said site-enabling work at RFK began in June, with main stadium construction set to start in spring 2027 and completion targeted for spring 2030, in time for the team to open its 2030 season there.
A $3.8 billion project years in the making
The selection was corroborated the same day by WJLA/ABC7 Washington. The construction announcement is the latest step in a stadium plan the District of Columbia Council approved in a lopsided 11-2 vote in September 2025, a deal city officials called the largest economic-development project in D.C. history. Under that agreement, the Commanders are financing roughly $2.7 billion of the project, while the D.C. government is contributing about $1.1 billion for surrounding infrastructure, parking and recreational space on the broader RFK campus.
The new stadium is designed to be enclosed and climate-controlled, with roughly 1.8 million square feet of space and capacity to host more than 200 events a year beyond Commanders games β a shift from the open-air RFK Stadium the team called home until 1996 and last played in during the 1996 season before moving to what is now Northwest Stadium in Landover, Maryland. Returning to Washington proper has been a stated priority for team ownership since Josh Harris’ group bought the franchise in 2023.
For the Washington region’s construction and real estate industry, the project represents one of the largest active development commitments in the market, arriving as the broader RFK campus is also being planned for additional housing, retail and green space once the stadium is complete. It joins a small group of multibillion-dollar sports-facility developments underway nationally, including plans for a new NBA arena on the Las Vegas Strip backed by VICI Properties and Caesars.
The scale of the financing commitment also mirrors a broader trend of lenders and owners lining up nine- and ten-figure sums for major urban construction projects, such as the $1.2 billion construction loan BXP recently secured for a Manhattan office tower.
What it means
The contractor selection confirms that the Commanders are moving from planning into execution on a timeline that would have the team playing at a new D.C. stadium in 2030 β a verified fact from the team’s own announcement. The $3.8 billion total project cost and the city-team financing split are drawn from the D.C. Council’s September 2025 approval, reported at the time by the Washington Post; RealtyWire is citing that figure as background context rather than new news, since Tuesday’s announcement covered the construction team, not new financing terms.
Whether the project stays on its spring 2027-to-spring 2030 construction schedule will be a story to watch, given the scale of simultaneous site work, financing drawdowns and the district’s parallel plans for the surrounding RFK campus.
