A federal judge extended a temporary order that blocks the Department of Homeland Security from withholding more than $33 million in anti-terrorism funding meant for the MTA, officials said.
The ruling, issued Wednesday by U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan, gives the state at least another week, until Oct. 22, to make its case in court. Without the order, the DHS could have allowed the money to be returned to the U.S. Treasury.
New York Attorney General Letitia James sued the agency last month, claiming the funding cut was illegal and politically motivated. Gov. Kathy Hochul joined the lawsuit, saying the decision threatened the safety of millions of daily riders.
“This court has again prevented the federal government from revoking critical counterterrorism funds for our state,” James and Hochul said in a joint statement. “These funds help keep our trains, buses, and subways safe for the millions of New Yorkers who rely on them every day.”
The money comes from a post-9/11 grant program created to protect high-risk transit systems. James said the MTA had been told it would receive nearly $34 million this year before the funding was slashed to zero without warning.
The legal fight over the MTA’s transit security funding comes even after the Trump administration reversed separate cuts to New York’s broader counterterrorism grants earlier this month, restoring $187 million following pushback from both Hochul and Republican members of the state’s congressional delegation.
Spokespeople for the DHS and the MTA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Phil Corso
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