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Lauren Due

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Congressman Josh Gottheimer will be speaking about this at that news conference this morning. He is joining us live right now on News 12 New Jersey. Congressman, thank you so much for your time this morning. Morning, morning. Are you expecting construction on this critical project to stop today? Well, I'm hoping the court, as you just mentioned, steps in at 1 o'clock in the Southern District and says it's absurd that we would shut this project down. Uh, as you mentioned, it's not just 1000 workers. You're talking about 200,000 commuters a day who rely on this rail, the tunnels that go underneath the Hudson River, and 20% of our nation's GDP runs through this. So, the, you know, the project's been moving, uh, you know, It's doing, they're doing an unbelievable job keeping this going, and it's replacing, as you know, 116 year old tunnels that are in operation right now. We need these tunnels in Congress, and I helped to negotiate pass and get these, these resources to Jersey, get them moving, and the idea that you'd have the White House just step in and say, yeah, put down your shovels, all workers, all work stop is ridiculous. Right, so there's the court part of this and then there's the deal making part of this which I think you're referencing there you have reached across the aisle on this. What does President Trump want to release the funding? Well, you know, well, what we've, as you just pointed out, I'm, I'm talking to my colleagues. In fact, I spoke to one of the Republicans, uh, last night to try to figure out how we get this thing done. Um, I've reached out and spoken to the White House. The job here for me and for my colleagues in Congress is to sit down and figure out how we keep this thing on track. The worst thing would be a long-term stop on this project. You're talking about $20 million a month, thousands of jobs held up. The time impact it would have on the project, and we've invested already a billion dollars. So what are we gonna do, light those dollars on fire and leave a big pit? I mean, the idea that we would stop this is, again, it's ridiculous. I will do anything and work with anyone to get this project moving. And so you, you'll imagine that many of us will keep pushing forward even as these lawsuits stay on track. What do you make of this report that says President Trump will release the money if Penn Station is named after him? I mean, I, I'm sure you'd agree that all, all this stuff is ridiculous, but the bottom line is, our job is to get this moving again. So what, I'm just gonna do my job, which is continue to work across the aisle with, with my colleagues in Congress, with the White House, and with anyone involved to get this thing uh resolved and keep the project moving forward. That's our job and I'm gonna do it, um, you know, and how we Get there, let's see what happens in the negotiations. But the bottom line is this, the fact that they have decided to stop a project that is critical, not just to our economy, not just to commuters, uh, but is a public safety issue given how old these tunnels are, um, it is ridiculous, and there's, there's absolutely no reason why they've, they've ordered this stoppage, you know, there's, there's no good explanation, um, but, you know, we, we are where we are. And Congressman, you mentioned this before, and I know you're hoping to prevent this from happening, but if construction is delayed for weeks or months, what does it mean long term for the project? I mean, besides the time setback here, the problem is, you know, we have all this equipment we've rented, um, without the resources, uh, and, you know, it's millions and millions of dollars that we've already invest a billion dollars invested in the project, but it has a huge impact on these workers, uh, on how we get, we keep the workers focused, right? Because if you, for a long period of time, there's no one on the job, they got to go do other work. Then you have to get it restarted again, not just from equipment, but Um, but obviously labor and we, we've got unbelievable, uh, hardworking men and women of labor who are on this project. Uh, you know, it, it causes a massive delay and a massive problem. And from a safety perspective, I can't stress this enough. We've got two tunnels, you know, one in and one out or the trains go under the Hudson Tunnel where all the, the, you know, the whole northeast artery moves through. If one of those goes down. Right? And, and we, we know there's safety issues. They're constantly working on these tunnels, and it slows everything down. You, I'm sure you've waited outside Penn Station. Um, if one of those goes down long term, uh, the hit to our economy and the people would be enormous. If, if it's worse than that from a public safety perspective, and you're putting people, people at risk, you know, the, the hands are the, the, the, the hand, the people who own this problem, and I, I wanna stress this, again, the people. own this problem are sitting in Washington and Pennsylvania Avenue, right? Uh, the administration owns this shutdown of these trains. And so, like, I'm really urging them to just resurrect this thing, to keep it moving, uh, and do the right thing here and stop playing games, stop playing politics, whatever reason they're coming up with, because as you know, there isn't a good one. There's just a lot of BS to cut the BS and just keep this thing moving. All right, we'll follow this throughout the day. Congressman Josh Gottheimer, we do appreciate you joining us live here on News 12 New Jersey this morning. Thanks for having me.

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The Gateway Tunnel Project is the nation's largest infrastructure project and construction has been ongoing for 27 months at five different sites.

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