President Donald Trump axes nearly $500 million in grants for NY energy businesses, projects
Governor Kathy Hochul accused President Donald Trump of "playing politics with the government shutdown." Credit: Sipa USA via AP/Lev Radin
A hydrogen fuel research center in suburban Rochester, a heat-pump factory in Syracuse and a ground-glass company in Westchester County are among 25 entities across New York whose energy grants have been canceled by the Trump administration, officials said Wednesday.
The grants, totaling nearly $500 million statewide, were terminated as part of the ongoing federal shutdown. Details were released recently by a congressional committee.
Gov. Kathy Hochul decried the cuts, calling them short-sighted and damaging. She accused President Donald Trump of "playing politics with the government shutdown" and eliminating New York jobs.
Some of the entities won grants just recently to increase jobs, such as Bitzer Scroll in Syracuse, which had won $5 million for its heat-pump factory and had planned on expanding. Also lost was $37 million for Urban Mining Industries, a New Rochelle-based company that grinds waste glass — think: bottles — into filler for concrete.
"These federal cuts are shutting down projects already underway. ... Communities that were on the brink of transformative growth will now face stalled investments and lost paychecks," said Hope Knight, CEO of Empire State Development.
The Trump administration didn’t immediately comment.
Generally, the White House has sought to blame Democrats for the shutdown, saying they refused to approve a GOP-backed bill to keep the government running. The Trump administration and Republican elected officials have asserted that it is Democrats’ fault if New York grants and programs are reduced in the interim.
"Nearly $8 billion in Green New Scam funding to fuel the left’s climate agenda is being canceled," Russell Vought, Trump’s budget director, wrote on social media when the cuts were executed.
Hochul released a list of 25 business and university-backed energy development grants that were canceled. None were based on Long Island.
Some were being counted on by local elected officials to create new jobs.
Nearly $5 million "has been cut for one of Brighton’s high technology businesses, Ionomr Innovations, which conducts cutting-edge clean technology research here," said William Moehle, supervisor in the Rochester suburb. "The Trump administration’s attacks on green energy investments are bad for the nation, but they are especially bad for Brighton."
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