When President Donald Trump froze funding for a monumental rail tunnel project connecting New Jersey and Manhattan, it was unclear how long construction could continue before money ran out. Today, officials finally have an end date: Feb. 6.
Trump announced the project would be frozen on the first day of last year’s government shutdown. Though his administration claimed it would review “unconstitutional DEI principles” in the project, many Democrats interpreted the move as a maneuver to pressure Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) to end the shutdown. But the shutdown ended months ago, and funding remains frozen.
Trump has said Schumer is “holding up” the Gateway project, and a visit by Schumer to the Oval Office was unsuccessful.
The Gateway Tunnel project, a $16 billion effort, will spend the next two weeks “winding down work” after it reached the end of a credit line, according to the Gateway Development Commission. The pause would instantly kill nearly 1,000 jobs, and an extended pause could risk a further 11,000 construction jobs, the GDC said.
“Since federal funding was paused in October, we have done everything in our power to keep construction moving forward as planned, but we cannot fund this work on credit indefinitely,” GDC CEO Thomas Prendergast said. “Pausing construction is the absolute last resort, and we will continue working around the clock to secure funding so that the workers who are counting on this project to pay their bills can stay on the job and we can continue delivering the reliable, 21st-century infrastructure America needs.”
The Gateway funding crisis has stretched into its second governorship, with Gov. Mikie Sherrill succeeding former Gov. Phil Murphy last week. In October, back when she was the Democratic nominee for governor, Sherrill promised that her attorney general would sue the Trump administration to release funding; Sherrill said she thought the Murphy administration should already be in court. Critics, including Sherrill, say Trump’s move illegally blocks congressionally appropriated funding.
On Tuesday, Sean Higgins, a Sherrill spokesperson, told the New Jersey Globe that, “All options, including litigation, are on the table should the Trump administration refuse to restore funding.”
“If the president does not restore funding to this project, which I helped secure while serving in Congress, he will single-handedly kill nearly 100,000 jobs and $20 billion in economic activity,” Sherrill said in a separate statement. “New Jersey will fight tooth and nail for our hard-earned tax dollars and this essential project that will make commutes easier and improve quality of life for residents in the Garden State.”
The GDC receives about 70% of the project’s funding from federal grants; the rest comes from U.S. Department of Transportation loans that will be paid back by New York, New Jersey, and the Port Authority. The Trump administration froze both forms of funding on Oct. 1.
The GDC said an extended pause increases the likelihood that the 116-year-old North River Tunnel will have to shut down, which would cripple the country’s most-used passenger rail line.
The Hudson Gateway project to expand rail capacity on the Northeast Corridor has been underway for years, ever since Gov. Chris Christie cancelled an earlier iteration of the project known as Access to the Region’s Core. The multi-billion-dollar project stalled again during Trump’s first term, only to start back up under President Joe Biden, with construction beginning in 2023 and a planned opening date set for 2035.
At a GDC meeting on Tuesday morning, Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-Tenafly) appealed to the president to restore funding.
“Canceling this train tunnel will kill jobs, crush our economy, and set us back as a nation. President Trump: I know you don’t want to derail our progress as a nation. This tunnel is 116 years old. If it collapses, America will blame you. If we fall behind and our economy here falters, American families and businesses of all sizes will blame you,” Gottheimer said. “On the flip side, you have an opportunity to do something historic — to finish one of the greatest infrastructure projects in American history.”
