New York and New Jersey filed their lawsuit Tuesday night in federal court in the Southern District of New York, seeking emergency relief to stop the U.S. Department of Transportation from continuing to implement its indefinite funding freeze.
Both governors Kathy Hochul and Mikie Sherrill said they will fight this effort by the Trump administration.
"Donald Trump's revenge tour on New York threatens to derail one of the most vital infrastructure projects this nation has built in generations, putting thousands of union jobs and billions of dollars in economic benefits in jeopardy and threatening the commutes of 200,000 riders," Hochul said.
"Every time the Trump Administration gets involved, costs go up and working people suffer. The illegal attack on the Gateway Tunnel is yet another example. New Jersey will not back down from this fight," Sherrill said.
A day earlier, the Gateway Development Commission filed their lawsuit in federal court in Washington, alleging the U.S. Department of Transportation breached its contractual obligations by withholding more than $205 million without any legal basis, claiming the funds were cut to punish Democrats over last fall's government shutdown.
President Donald Trump said in October that he had terminated the project, and without additional funding, the Gateway Development Commission warned it will be unable to continue work on the $16 billion project after Friday. That could leave about 1,000 union workers without jobs.
In the lawsuit, the commission said that without federal funding this week, it will be unable to pay contractors to continue construction activities, causing work on the critical project to grind to a halt. The filing warns this would leave unfinished work sites with massive holes in the ground, threaten the livelihoods of hundreds of construction employees, burden the commission with enormous costs from delays and penalties, and put the future viability of the project into question.
The tunnel project would build two new rail tubes under the Hudson River and is widely seen as critical to avoiding future disruptions in rail travel.
White House spokesperson Kush Desai last week tied the tunnel funding to an ongoing dispute over immigration enforcement, saying, "It's Chuck Schumer and Democrats who are standing in the way of a deal for the Gateway Tunnel Project by refusing to negotiate with the Trump administration. There is nothing stopping Democrats from prioritizing the interests of Americans over illegal aliens and getting this project back on track."
"As this lawsuit makes clear, President Trump has illegally frozen congressionally appropriated and contractually obligated funding for Gateway," said Senator Chuck Schumer. "This lawsuit would be unnecessary if President Trump did the right thing for New York and New Jersey and lifted his arbitrary freeze. Gateway is the most important infrastructure project in the country, and tens of thousands of union workers depend on it moving forward."
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