Saturday, January 20, 2018
Trump dumps $13 billion Obama-backed NY-NJ rail tunnel plan
On the LegalInsurrection website, Leslie Eastman posted this:
"The expressly stated reason given by Trump administration officials is that they view this project as local in nature.
…[I]n a letter Friday, the Trump administration notified New York and New Jersey that the Obama-era deal was now “non-existent” because the states recently requested that their portions be covered by loans from the federal government — meaning Washington would supply all of the initial funding for what the Trump White House is calling 'a local project.'
'Your letter also references a non-existent ’50/50′ agreement between USDOT, New York, and New Jersey. There is no such agreement,” wrote K. Jane Williams, deputy administrator of the Federal Transit Administration. 'We consider it unhelpful to reference a non-existent ‘agreement’ rather than directly address the responsibility for funding a local project where nine out of 10 passengers are local transit riders.'"
