MTA Hopes Trump Administration Delivers $600 Million in COVID Relief Before Riders Foot the Bill

Bureaucratic feuds over post-pandemic assistance threaten to deepen New York’s transit funding woes, with consequences rippling from commuters to the city’s economic health.

Passengers crammed shoulder-to-shoulder on the 4 train may be forgiven for missing a quieter struggle unfolding on the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s balance sheets: a $600m shortfall dating to the darkest days of the pandemic. The MTA, whose subways and buses daily carry nearly six million New Yorkers, is still awaiting reimbursement from the federal government for COVID-19 expenses incurred in 2020 and 2021. That sum, sought from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), would patch budget holes left by costly contracts for extra cleaning and staffing—measures hastily assembled when a frightened city tried to disinfect away the virus and restore public confidence.

This week, the state’s chief bookkeeper, Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, sounded the alarm anew. The MTA’s plea to FEMA—a bureaucratic saga now spanning two administrations—remains stuck in review, victim to shifting political winds. In the meantime, the agency must reckon with a yawning $300m deficit each year through 2027. Riders and taxpayers are bracing for the MTA board’s 2026 financial plan, expected next month, that will offer scant comfort and perhaps more proposals for fare hikes, service cuts, or job losses.

For New York, the stakes are not merely fiscal. The city’s transit arteries are its lifeblood, with workers, students, and tourists alike dependent on regular, affordable service. A $600m shortfall, modest by the standards of the federal purse, translates into very real pain for local residents: more crowded trains, longer waits, the spectre of layoffs, and—inevitably—another bump in the price of a MetroCard.

The MTA’s predicament inevitably forces difficult trade-offs. Jai Patel, the agency’s chief financial officer, touts cost-cutting and a campaign against fare evasion as stopgap measures. Yet these can only do so much: fare evasion, though vexing, is not a $600m problem. And past rounds of belt-tightening have already left the system creaking, with maintenance delays, frustrated workers, and customers warily eyeing their travel options.

If the money fails to materialise, the risks metastasise—well beyond the turnstiles. Transit-reliant firms might curtail hiring or relocate; employees may return to remote work (if they can), sapping Midtown businesses of foot traffic. Past experience suggests cuts, once enacted, are punishingly slow to reverse—even when the economy is buoyant. The “fiscal pain”, as Ana Champeny of the Citizens Budget Commission delicately put it, risks becoming chronic if vast bureaucracies in Albany and Washington cannot coordinate.

Trump era’s return, Biden era’s shadow

The historical context is not encouraging. The federal response to pandemic transit losses was generous but scattershot: after a flurry of appropriations in 2020 and 2021, aid grew tepid and then evaporated as political focus shifted. Though the MTA’s FEMA application originated during the Biden administration, even friendly Democrats failed to pry loose the necessary funds. Now, with President Trump’s administration locked in a feud with New York over everything from the Gateway tunnel to anti-terror funds, the outlook has dimmed further.

Other metropolitan transit agencies can commiserate. In Chicago and San Francisco, operators confront similar headwinds—waning ridership, rising costs, and minimal federal largesse. Yet New York’s system, by dint of its massive scale and outsized economic importance, offers a test case: if the nation’s largest mass-transit system must threaten cuts over a paltry $600m shortfall, then what hope is there for smaller cities with even thinner fiscal margins?

The interplay of national and state priorities only complicates matters. New York’s leaders, knowing the city’s importance to America’s GDP, have typically succeeded at wringing out federal rescue money—until now. But as federal infrastructure funding grows more partisan and discretionary, cities like New York can no longer count on rescue missions from Washington. Administrative delays, political brawling, and the inevitable finger-pointing seem now baked into the process.

Limited options and long-term risks

Inside the MTA’s budget office, the calculus is grim. New York law obliges the board to balance the books each year—no creative accounting, no wishful projections. If FEMA funds remain stuck, only three levers remain: raise fares, reduce service, or trim payroll. All are unpalatable for a city still regaining its economic footing after COVID-19, where nearly 40% of all commuters use transit, according to the most recent census.

History bodes ill for fare-based solutions alone. The MTA tried a $2.90 base fare in 2023, provoking howls but little lasting change to its finances. Ridership—though recovering—has not rebounded to pre-pandemic highs, as hybrid work and crime anxieties dampen demand. Service cuts, meanwhile, can trigger a downward spiral: fewer trains mean more delays, driving even more New Yorkers to taxis, bikes, or cars.

That leaves state and city taxpayers, who have already footed billions for emergency transit aid and are themselves groaning under budget cuts and post-pandemic deficits (Albany faced a $9.5bn gap last year). New York’s famed budget “creativity” may stave off the worst this fiscal year, but over the long run, chronic underfunding could seed deeper malaise—dilapidated stations, deferred repairs, and a system less resilient to future shocks.

Stern necessity often breeds innovation, but, for now, we see little sign that the financial fudge will yield any such breakthrough. The culture of temporary patches over structural reform prevails, even as agencies like the MTA shoulder mandates without matching support. Fare evasion “crackdowns” and calls for efficiency offer only so much solace; absent predictability in federal support, transit chiefs are left hoping for a reprieve from above.

All this unfolds as major capital projects hang in limbo. Squabbles over COVID arrears have already cast a pall over plans for the Gateway tunnels, the Second Avenue subway extension, and vital counterterrorism investments. Uncertainty radiates outward, jeopardising not only today’s commutes but the city’s future capacity and resilience in a more volatile world.

If New York, locomotive of America’s urban economy, cannot secure $600m reimbursement for pandemic operations, it portends a starker reality. Federal-state coordination, already puny, may be entering an era of fragmentation—shrinking the realm for grand ambitions in American infrastructure.

The MTA’s saga is, in this sense, instructive and cautionary. The agency is adept at wrangling both riders and federal auditors; that New York finds itself at the mercy of faraway administrators underscores a wider 21st-century truth. Big cities must increasingly fend for themselves, and, barring a miraculous vault of cash from FEMA, the riders of the 4 train—and every other—may pay the price. ■