MTA threatens Trump admin with legal action over its Second Avenue Subway funding freeze
A rendering of the proposed station at 106th Street and Second Avenue.
Photo by MTA
MTA Chair and CEO Janno Lieber said on Wednesday that the agency had issued an ultimatum to the Trump administration, demanding the release of $60 million in reimbursements for the East Harlem extension of the Second Avenue Subway by next week, or face legal action.
The MTA boss, during the agency board’s monthly meeting on Feb. 25, said the agency sent the warning letter to the White House through its outside counsel at the behest of Gov. Kathy Hochul.
Lieber said that while the Second Avenue Subway has been in a better cash-flow situation than the Gateway Tunnel rail project — which just resumed work after having to pause construction earlier this month, due to its own funding freeze — there is a vital contract for station excavation that the agency will not be able to approve without the federal funds.
The Trump administration finally released the Gateway funds last week, after it was compelled to do so by a Manhattan federal judge who ruled in response to a suit brought by New York and New Jersey Attorneys General Letitia James and Jennifer Davenport.
“It’s no secret that Second Avenue Subway has not been receiving funding reimbursements from the federal government for quite some time,” Lieber said. “We can’t chance an impact to the project’s schedule and budget by letting the federal situation drag on and on. So we have sent the letter to the feds, just putting them on notice, that honestly, time’s up.”
The $6.9 billion project will add three new stations along the Q line at 106th St, 116th St, and 125th St. The contract that Lieber said will be impacted by the feds continuing to withhold the funds is for excavating new stations at 106th St and 125th St.
Lieber said the MTA continued to submit reimbursement requests for the $60 million it is owed even after the feds froze the funding near the beginning of the last government shutdown in October. He charged that at a certain point, the feds shut the MTA out of their online reimbursement portal, so the agency is owed even more than the $60 million it has formally requested.
“After they told us to stop submitting invoices and we didn’t, they actually shut down our access to the portal that is used for this process,” Lieber said. “So we have more money even beyond the $60 million that’s really justified to be spent, to be reimbursed.”
Similar to the Gateway project, the Trump administration said it froze the funds to review the MTA’s compliance with its recently revised rules for contracting with minority- and women-owned businesses. Lieber has repeatedly said that the MTA has answered the feds’ questions about its Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) program and shown how it will align with the new rules.
