Cuomo says he had ‘good’ talks with Trump on New York infrastructure projects

Gov. Andrew Cuomo insisted he had a “good conversation” with President Trump during their Wednesday White House meeting on New York’s infrastructure — but sure didn’t seem in any rush to talk about it.

After emerging from the sit-down, Cuomo held a press briefing in which he went the first half-hour recycling go-to talking points with nary a mention of the meeting with the commander in chief.

Only when prodded by reporters at the National Press Club in Washington, DC, did Cuomo cough up a few details about the huddle, which he said was focused on ramping up infrastructure projects in New York, both for their own sake and to revitalize the state’s coronavirus-hobbled economy.

“It was not about politics,” Cuomo said. “It was about, how do we supercharge the reopening, especially in New York, which has been harder hit.”

Among the projects Cuomo highlighted were the revitalization and expansion of the Hudson River Amtrak tunnels, the overhaul of the AirTrain at LaGuardia Airport and the next phase of the Second Avenue subway.

“It was a good conversation,” said Cuomo. “I think the president also acknowledges and realizes that in New York we’re very aggressive about getting these projects done and getting them done on time.

“I have a shovel in the trunk of my car, we’ll start this afternoon.”

Despite his eagerness, Cuomo said that he kept his wish list short to avoid overwhelming the president.

“I didn’t want to give him too long a list. I didn’t want to seem too aggressive,” he said. “I didn’t want to seem like … a quintessential New Yorker.”

One thing Cuomo said didn’t come up during the meeting was his attempt to pin responsibility on Trump for a widely criticized policy prohibiting nursing homes from turning away coronavirus-positive patients.

The governor said that his telling critics earlier this month to “ask President Trump” about the mandate was just meant to highlight what he claims is the partisan nature of the criticism, and attacked The Post for reporting on the firestorm issue.

While in Washington, Cuomo took the time to renew his call for lawmakers to provide sorely needed funding for state and local governments during the next round of financial relief talks, specifically calling out Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

As he did earlier in the pandemic, Cuomo decried the “ugly” partisan stance that aid for hard-hit states including New York are “blue-state bailouts.”

“Do you really want to cut schools now? Do you really want to cut hospitals now?” asked Cuomo, referring to what he has warned the fallout will include if New York doesn’t get the aid it needs.

Cuomo also offered an update on the coronavirus fight back home, where metrics continue to move in the right direction, if at an agonizingly slow pace.

Total hospitalizations and the three-day rolling average of new hospital admissions both continued to decline — the latter to 181, the lowest figure since the pandemic’s onset in late March.

However, another 74 New Yorkers died in the 24-hour period ending at midnight Wednesday, holding steady after 73 were lost in the period prior and raising the overall number of confirmed deaths to 23,643.

“Only in this time of crisis would 74 deaths be anything less than truly tragic news,” said Cuomo. “But when you’ve gone through what we have gone through, it’s a sign that we are headed in the right direction.”