Government Lawyers Mistakenly Admit New York Congestion Pricing Is Legal

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration’s lawyers appear to have booby-trapped their own chances this week of defeating New York City’s congestion pricing program that charges motorists for driving downtown.

They inadvertently filed a memo with the court overseeing a lawsuit between the state and federal government that admits failings in their case.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul instituted the program this year that charges drivers an average of $9 for driving in the most congested parts of the city.

Traffic congestion fell by 11% immediately afterward. The revenue the program directed to the city’s transit system is helping pay for upgrades.

President Donald Trump tried to end the program with an executive order. He called congestion pricing too much of a regulatory burden on motorists.

The state sued, leading the Justice Department lawyers to mistakenly file a brief this week that described flaws in the Trump administration’s legal reasoning and implying they would lose the case.

The U.S. Transportation Department officially argues that congestion pricing could only be authorized legally under local authority if it is a pilot program and intended specifically to reduce traffic, not to raise revenue.

The three attorneys who filed the brief in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York wrote that “we have been unable to identify a compelling legal argument to support this position.” 

Their legal maneuverings are running up against a deadline the Transportation Department set for Sunday requiring New York to comply with its order.

Hochul said she has no intention of ending congestion pricing.

“The program is working. Traffic is down, business is up and the cameras are staying on,” says a statement this week from Hochul’s spokesperson.

The Transportation Department is equally determined the program should end.

“USDOT will continue to fight for working-class Americans whose tax dollars have already funded and paid for these roads,” it said in a statement.

So far, a federal judge presiding over the case has sided with New York by saying the tolls appear to be a legal exercise of state discretion under constitutional law. The mistaken filing by Justice Department attorneys reached similar conclusions.

The Justice Department replaced the lawyers on Thursday after they filed the memo a day earlier. The court’s schedule indicates the case will continue until at least the fall before the judge issues a final ruling.

The congestion pricing that took effect Jan. 5 is intended to relieve traffic problems that are consistently ranked among the worst for American cities. Money from the tolls is being put back into the subway system.

The $9 tolls are charged on all vehicles in New York’s central city from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. weekdays and 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. weekends.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy tried to win Hochul’s compliance by telling her in a letter that the federal government has jurisdiction over highways leading into New York, meaning the tolls are unfair to anyone entering the city from outside of it.

She replied in a post on social media site X saying, “The cameras are staying on.”

The government attorneys referred to Duffy’s order for New York to turn off the toll readers used to bill motorists as “contrary to law.”

The memo they misdirected into a court filing originally was addressed to the Transportation Department’s senior trial lawyer.

They wrote that “there is considerable litigation risk in defending the secretary’s Feb. 19, 2025, decision against plaintiffs’ claims under the Administrative Procedure Act.”’

They added that the order was “procedurally arbitrary and capricious, and violated due process … [and] it is unlikely that Judge Liman or further courts of review will accept the argument that the [New York City Central Business District Tolling Program] was not a statutorily authorized [program].” 

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