The Trump administration, specifically U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, rescinded the federal government’s approval during the Biden administration of New York State’s imposition of congestion pricing tolls for vehicles driving into the southern half of Manhattan in New York City.
This action is now shaping up as an epic battle between President Donald Trump and his former deep-blue home state dominated by Democrats determined to retain the tolls. The toll scheme also has become a dividing line in the upcoming Democratic mayoral primary between embattled Mayor Eric Adams and his challenger, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
Secretary Duffy said the congestion tolls are “a slap in the face to working-class Americans and small-business owners” and “backwards and unfair” since there is no free access to half of Manhattan on roads that drivers funded and maintain from gasoline and other taxes.
The New York City congestion toll-tax scheme has national implications. If allowed to continue, it could proliferate to pre-existing public roadways in jurisdictions throughout the nation as the ever-greedy political class and unscrupulous climate grifters find ways to extract more cash from the public.
Call it a promise made/promise kept by President Trump, who committed during the campaign to remove the tolls. After ordering the toll rescission, he stated he criticized the state and city for their refusal to crack down on subway and bus fare beaters, which loses $800 million annually and exceeds the projected revenue of the congestion tax.
New York continues to collect the $9.00 automobile and $14.40 to $21.60 truck taxes for entering the Manhattan congestion zone. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which operates the tolls and is controlled by Gov. Kathy Hochul, sued to block the Trump-directed reversal.
Congestion tolls were first floated for Manhattan two decades ago when the New York City Mayor at the time, Michael Bloomberg, a champion of climate change fanaticism and the nanny state, proposed them. The state legislature instead rejected the idea.
Fast forward to 2019, when then-Gov. Cuomo signed the congestion tax into law as he sought to juxtapose himself with the legislature’s “progressive” shift further to the political left and parrot the bogus climate change narrative to reduce vehicle emissions. After resigning in disgrace in 2021 to avoid certain removal by the legislature for multiple sexual harassment claims, Cuomo came out last year against the congestion tax he made a reality. Now we know why, since he recently announced he is running for New York City mayor against fellow Democrat Mayor Adams.
Five years after Cuomo authorized the toll-tax, and $500 million spent for installation, Gov. Hochul halted the tolls in June 2024 just prior to them taking effect.
“I cannot add another burden to working middle-class New Yorkers,” Hochul said at the time (with her fingers crossed behind her back).
Hochul’s mendacious action came at the behest of U.S. House leader Hakeem Jeffries of Brooklyn to curry favor for his New York City metropolitan congressional candidates before the November elections.
Five months later, following the elections—surprise!—Governor Flim-Flam announced that, in fact, she can and will add another burden to working middle-class New Yorkers. The toll-taxes were back on and went into effect January 5th, and a reminder of why the public generally despises politicians.
Governor Hochul met in vain with President Trump during the National Governor’s Association meeting last month to get him to reconsider nixing the congestion tax. Her spokesperson said that she presented to the president “a booklet on the early success of congestion pricing.”
Talk about a political tin ear.
A new Quinnipiac University poll found that New York City voters oppose congestion tolls by 54-to-41 percent. The establishment big business group, New York City Partnership, commissioned a Morning Consult poll that claims 59 percent of voters want President Trump to “allow congestion pricing in New York City to continue” (emphasis mine). Well, sure, invoke Trump’s name and deceptively label it “pricing” (not tolls) to the City’s overwhelming Democratic electorate and you get a result that distorts reality.
The bottom line: drivers from throughout the area are paying substantially more to enter the heart of New York City, which indeed has reduced traffic in lower Manhattan thus far by a measly 7.5%—Bravo! — as though that electron-lite amount will curtail “climate change.” Yet, to no surprise, increased traffic and emissions outside the zone has resulted. Congestion taxes also are being passed on by businesses and contractors to millions of consumers residing and working in the lower half of Manhattan. Some “success”.
The congestion tolls are a microcosm of what always happens when climate policies are imposed: Americans pay more, the economy suffers, the standard of living drops, and the climate goes on changing like the wind, unaffected.
As with other costly and useless climate scams, President Trump rightly pulled the plug, hopefully to bury congestion taxes permanently in the grave.
Peter Murphy is Senior Fellow at the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), a Washington D.C.-based not-for-profit that supports free-market, technological solutions to energy and environmental challenges.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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