I was upset by this headline @ WaPo and NYT, because they really were spy hidey holes, going quite a ways back. BUT then I read further and all that's going on right now is talking a trade as in if Moscow would lift its freeze, imposed in 2014 in retaliation for U.S. sanctions related to Ukraine, on construction of a new U.S. consulate on a certain parcel of land in St. Petersburg then they would consider giving them the properties back. BUT this time, they could just be property like any other, no diplomatic immunity, no protection (and like leave the bugs in place so the FBI can listen to everything.) Sooo I decided: this is much ado about nothing so far,hard to believe with the Trump admin., I know, but not much different so far from what any administration might do. Including Obama. It's just the whole tit-for-tat game that's been going on since the Cold War.  

I follow this stuff because the huge Russian state (formerly USSR) property for U.N. consulate staff and families in NYC in Riverdale in the Bronx is very near where I have lived for a long time. So I've followed this stuff in like, "The Riverdale Press". In early 2015 we had the arrest of one of the Russian spies in my grocery store, it's like local news.Some of them, like the one spy, rent private houses in the hood instead of living in the compound. I don't know why the NYC property wasn't seized by Obama in late 2016, I think it is more protected than those others or maybe all the action had now moved to L.I. & MD joints. Whatever. About 10 years ago a bunch of Jewish-Russian refugees in the hood lobbyied to have an honorary street name change for the street the Russian compound is on. They got their wish: the street sign on one corner of the Russian compound now says "Natan Sharansky Place"