WASHINGTON -- A leading congressional opponent of the Gateway project is citing former Gov. Chris Christie's earlier decision to kill a separate Hudson River train tunnel in urging his colleagues to cut off federal funds.

U.S. Rep. Ted Budd, R-N.C., noted Christie's actions in a Wall Street Journal op-ed opposing federal funding for Gateway, which includes a new train tunnel under the Hudson River and a new Portal Bridge over the Hackensack River.

Christie killed the Access to the Region's Core, or ARC, tunnel in October 2010, saying he was worried that New Jersey would get saddled with big cost overruns. That new tunnel originally was scheduled to open this year.

Budd also mentioned Christie's action last September when the congressman led the unsuccessful effort to strip $900 million earmarked for Gateway from a House bill funding the government through Sept. 30, 2018. He plans to try again if Gateway is included in the final spending bill.

"For federal taxpayers, the shifty details of Gateway's history add insult to the program's injurious costs," Budd said in the Journal article.

"Mr. Christie took the estimated $3 billion in fees collected to finance the project and diverted them into the state highway trust fund -- a bit of budgetary sleight-of-hand that helped him avoid raising New Jersey's gasoline tax before his 2013 re-election bid."

Christie, a Republican, later approved a 23-cent per gallon increase in the gas tax.

A spokesman for Christie did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday.

Christie last year defended pulling the plug on the ARC Tunnel, saying the deal "stunk" for New Jersey taxpayers because New York wouldn't have paid its "fair share" and the line would have ended at Macy's basement, making it difficult for commuters to get to other lines.

"I have absolutely no regrets about that decision, and over the course of time that decision will be proved to be right," Christie said last April.

U.S. Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-5th Dist., called Christie's earlier action on ARC "a significant mistake."

"We're years behind and billions of dollars in economic productivity behind for the state because of that decision," Gottheimer said.

Budd said in separate statements Thursday that President Donald Trump was "absolutely right" to oppose federal funding for Gateway and applauded his reported threat to veto the spending bill if money for the train tunnels are included.

"President Trump is absolutely right to fight this world-class boondoggle," Budd said. "The $900 million earmark for this project in the House transportation bill is more money down the drain in an area where subway and rail construction costs are the highest in the world."

U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao told a House Transportation Committee hearing earlier this week that the administration opposed a project in which New Jersey and New York would pay less than 5 percent of the costs.

But the original funding agreement had the federal and state governments each paying 50 percent of the costs, though New Jersey and New York had hoped to help pay their share through a federal railroad loan program, paying the money back over 35 years.

Budd's home state of North Carolina received $1.41 from Washington for every $1 paid in federal taxes in 2015, according to the State University of New York's Rockefeller Institute of Government.

New Jersey received just 74 cents per $1 in federal taxes paid, lowest among the 50 states, and New York ranked 49th with 81 cents.

Budd's effort last September drew support from a majority of House Republicans. They first voted to spend billions to help Texas and Louisiana recover from Hurricane Harvey before opposing funding that would allow the existing Hudson River tunnels to be closed so Hurricane Sandy damage could be repaired.

The need to fix the damage grows more urgent, and Christie's decision on ARC delayed efforts to build new tunnels, Gottheimer said.

"You can't get back time," Gottheimer said. "We are facing a shot clock and we don't have much time left on that clock."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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