CHICAGO — CHICAGO (AP) — President Donald Trump’s administration will withhold $2.1 billion for Chicago infrastructure projects, the White House budget director said Friday, expanding funding fights that have targeted Democratic areas during the government shutdown.
The pause affects a long-awaited plan to extend the city’s Red Line train. The money was “put on hold to ensure funding is not flowing via race-based contracting,” budget director Russ Vought wrote on social media.
Vought made a similar announcement earlier this week involving New York, where he said $18 billion for infrastructure would be paused, including funding for a new rail tunnel under the Hudson River.
Trump, a Republican, has embraced Vought’s tactics. On Thursday night, he posted a video depicting him as the reaper, wearing a hood and holding a scythe.
Losing the money would be a significant setback for Chicago’s transportation plans. The Red Line extension is slated to add four train stops on the city’s South Side, improving access for disadvantaged communities.
Rogers Jones, the director of a violence prevention youth center next to the planned Roseland Red Line station, called the delay a severe blow to some of the region’s most disadvantaged areas.
Officials have demolished houses, widened streets, cut grass and put up signs throughout the area in preparation for the new station, he said.
“If you talk to any neighbors today, they want to curse, because they’ve been anticipating that,” Jones said. “I just don’t understand the Trump administration, bringing harm like that. It’s devastating when people are expecting something good coming and it does not come.”
In addition, a broader modernization project for the Red