NY’s MTA Sues Trump Administration Over Frozen Subway Funds (1)

New York City’s transit system sued the Trump administration to unpause federal funds tied to a $7 billion project that would extend the Second Avenue subway to Harlem.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, a state agency that runs the city’s subway, bus and commuter rail lines, warned last month that it would have to take such action if it failed to receive about $60 million of federal cash for the project by March 6.

“The federal government has to make good on its legal commitments in the grant agreement, which says you gotta reimburse us when we put in the requisitions,” Janno Lieber, the MTA’s chief financial officer, told reporters on Tuesday. “And they continued to refuse to do so.”

Other work will continue, but any delay could risk the MTA’s plan to provide service starting in the fall of 2032, according to the agency. The project will extend the Q-train from 96th Street to 125th Street in Harlem and build three new stations.

Funds for the project have been on hold since October as the US Department of Transportation reviews whether the project meets a new federal rule that prohibits contracting requirements based on race or gender.

“USDOT is committed to ensuring hardworking taxpayer dollars are being spent responsibly,” a spokesperson for the department wrote in an emailed statement. “We are considering all legal avenues.”

Without the funding, the MTA said it will be unable to enter an agreement with a contractor to begin excavating a new 106th Street subway station, which is part of the extension.

“Once again, New York has been forced to sue the Trump Administration to stop them from erratically shutting off billions of dollars in previously committed infrastructure funding,” New York Governor Kathy Hochul said in a statement on Tuesday.

Similar legal suits have found success recently. A federal judge last month ordered the Trump administration to release funds it had suspended since October for a new passenger rail tunnel under the Hudson River, called Gateway. New York and New Jersey filed suit seeking to release the money as did the Gateway Development Commission, which is building the rail tunnel. Construction restarted shortly afterward.

Read More: NY-NJ Gateway Work to Resume Next Week With Federal Funds

“These projects are not political bargaining chips; they are lifelines for New York’s economy and union workers, and we will fight until every dollar of promised funding is delivered,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement Tuesday.

(Updates with comments from MTA in third paragraph, USDOT in fifth paragraph, Senate Minority Leader in last paragraph.)

To contact the reporters on this story:
Michelle Kaske in New York at mkaske@bloomberg.net;
Chris Dolmetsch in Federal Court in Manhattan at cdolmetsch@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Claire Ballentine at cballentine@bloomberg.net

Danielle Moran

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