Trump just 'locked in loss for Republicans' by scrapping massive project: Democrat

President Donald Trump's administration announced the halt of two massive projects in New York City on Wednesday, cutting billions of dollars for the hometown of the Democratic Party's leaders just hours after a government shutdown.

But the move just killed the Republican Party's dreams of winning the governorship in neighboring New Jersey, Sen. Andy Kim (D-NJ) said.

"Roughly $18 billion in New York City infrastructure projects have been put on hold to ensure funding is not flowing based on unconstitutional DEI principles. More info to come soon from USDOT," wrote Russ Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, on X.

The project includes an extension to the city's subway system and the Hudson Tunnel project — also known as the Gateway Project — a massive connection between New York City and New Jersey that would replace crumbling infrastructure used by millions of train commuters every day.

According to Kim, "This is one of the most absurd things that I've ever heard. It's so clearly an illegal action in terms of just having political retribution back and using taxpayer dollars to be able to fund that. One of my constituents is [Transportation] Secretary [Sean] Duffy. He knows the importance of this. He and I have talked about the national importance of the Gateway Project. It is absolutely reckless for him to do this, and it's going to put a lot of New Jerseyans in a really tough spot."

That said, Kim thinks it is "going to backfire on [Trump], backfire on this administration."

"It's going to really just hit home just how much they're willing to inflict pain on Americans, just to make a political point," said Kim.

Some polls show a close contest between Republican Jack Ciattarelli and Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-NJ) to take the governorship in next month's election.

"I really think they made a real political mistake in taking this on. It's going to hurt a lot of Americans, a lot of people in my own state. And this is a great way for Donald Trump to just ensure that the Republicans lose the governor's race," said Kim.

"I think he really just locked in that loss for the Republicans," said Kim. "And with the candidate ... in New Jersey, saying that Trump can do no wrong, that he can't think of anything that he disagrees with Trump on. I'd like him to explain that answer."