WASHINGTON — The Federal Emergency Management Agency is refusing to come up with almost $300 million that New Jersey Transit and state officials said the commuter rail system is owed to pay for damages caused by Hurricane Sandy.

The dispute has reached the desk of FEMA Administrator Brock Long, whose agency twice has rejected requests to provide federal funds that U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez said the transit system is entitled to under legislation he wrote years earlier as chairman of the Senate mass transit subcommittee.

“I’ve seen a lot of crazy things by FEMA,” Menendez, D-N.J., said in an interview. "This is one of the most absurd things.”

If FEMA rejects the final appeal, the parties could wind up in court, further delaying payments to a public transportation system that has been underfunded for years.

The federal funds are "critical to restoring parts of our infrastructure damaged due to Superstorm Sandy,” said Matthew Saidel, a spokesman for Gov. Phil Murphy.

FEMA spokeswoman Lizzie Litzow said the latest appeal is under review. Menendez and U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., pressed the state’s case by phone with Long on Dec. 6 and followed up with a letter six days later.

It’s the latest dispute between the Garden State and President Donald Trump.

Since taking office in January 2017, Trump tried to kill federal funds for the Gateway Tunnel project under the Hudson River, needed because the existing train tunnels were damaged by Hurricane Sandy; championed a tax bill that targeted New Jersey by capping the federal deduction for state and local taxes; and endorsed GOP Affordable Care Act repeal efforts that transferred funds away from states like New Jersey that expanded Medicaid.

“Whether it’s concerted or just individual rifle shots, we’re getting hurt,” Menendez said. “This is another example of something that should be a no-brainer, just like the Gateway Tunnel should be a no-brainer. This is another example of New Jersey being hurt, arbitrarily and capriciously, in this case by FEMA."

Menendez has clashed with FEMA before over its response to Hurricane Sandy. He successfully pressured the agency during President Barack Obama’s administration to reopen claims of Sandy homeowners who were shortchanged by private insurance companies assessing hurricane damage.

This latest fight involved a provision Menendez added to the 2012 transportation bill that set up a Transit Emergency Relief Program in case of a major disaster. The measure became law months before Sandy pummeled New Jersey.

In separate legislation providing $60 million for Sandy relief, federal lawmakers said FEMA would cover 90 percent of the costs of hurricane-related damage, with state and local agencies responsible for the remaining 10 percent.

For NJ Transit, that put the federal government on the hook for $728 million of the $809 million damage assessment. The deal was that Federal Transit Administration would pay the costs until its allocation ran out, and FEMA would cover the rest.

The transit agency ponied up $445 million. FEMA suggested that NJ Transit also use $188 million in federal transit funds earmarked for projects to protect against future storms to help pay the damage from the last one. NJ Transit said no.

That left FEMA on the hook for about $283 million.

After the federal transit funding ran out, NJ Transit asked FEMA to start paying the bills. That was in December 2016.

Then the entire 14-member bipartisan New Jersey congressional delegation weighed in.

“Having a robust and effective transit system is not a luxury — it’s a necessity for our economy and for our quality of life,” they wrote to FEMA in February 2017.

FEMA rejected the application in April. The state appealed in June. The following May, almost a year later, Regional Administrator Thomas Von Essen turned down the appeal. He said FEMA did not owe any more money because the Federal Transit Administration was the sole source of funding for transit damage.

The state appealed again Aug. 2. “At no point was FTA designated as the sole or exclusive provider of Sandy disaster relief funds for mass transit disaster recovery," wrote Daniel Kelly, executive director of the Governor’s Office of Recovery and Rebuilding.

In the middle of the second appeal, the agency suddenly changed its reason for the rejection.

Von Essen told Kelly in a letter dated Aug. 13 that the Trump administration rejected the request because it made a “discretionary policy determination” that the transit administration would be the “sole source of restoration funds.”

Except, according to Menendez, the statute doesn’t say that.

“I wrote the law,” Menendez said. “This is pretty outrageous."

Jonathan D. Salant may be reached at jsalant@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JDSalant or on Facebook. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.