Grants are under attack on two fronts: Congress should stand up to USDOT and assert its power over the purse

Not only is the Trump administration’s USDOT potentially trying to run out the clock for FY22 grants it does not like, but it’s also in parallel cancelling competitive grants awarded to localities and communities across the country. These communities worked tirelessly to secure funding for projects focused on things like the safety of people walking and biking and reducing transportation barriers. Enough should be enough– Congress needs to step up and assert its role over policy before negotiating the next reauthorization.

Certain federal grant funding is expiring at the end of the month

Last week, we warned about a potential “pocket rescission”-style strategy from the US Department of Transportation, intended to run out the clock on certain programs’ previously awarded Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act grants before the funds become unavailable at the end of the federal fiscal year on September 30. Even more concerningly, USDOT may have an internal deadline to obligate funds by as early as next week, in order to close out grant administration before the end of the fiscal year, reducing awardees’ window of time for action.

To understand what is at risk, we analyzed available data for some of the programs most at risk, taking a look at USDOT’s lists of “approved” grants (which are supposedly safe for obligation) and public federal obligation data reported on USASpending.gov.

Altogether, across seven programs that we evaluated (though more could be at risk), we identified over $400 million for projects that could be at risk, and we are tracking them here. In just those programs, we found over 50 projects with awards that did not seem to have any obligations associated with them on USAspending.gov, or were apparently not included among USDOT’s latest list of “approved” grants.

USDOT is also directly cancelling grants that don’t align with their new priorities

Unfortunately, this grant expiration issue is not the only one facing advocates. On August 7, 2025, the White House issued an executive order, making it easier to cancel grants in the future and setting a standard that all discretionary grants should “demonstrably advance the President’s policy priorities.”

Now, independent of the expiration of FY22 grants, USDOT has sent multiple letters cancelling non-state DOT entities’ discretionary grant awards. In at least three places —New Mexico, Illinois, and Connecticut—local news coverage has picked up on the issue, but it is likely much more widespread. More examples of projects we believe to be cancelled can be found on this sheet, but when USDOT controls all funding decision-making, grant recipients can be hesitant to come forward with news on cancellations publicly, out of fear of future reprisal.

In total, we believe there are roughly 200 projects that may not be approved by the Trump administration, and remain unobligated out of the initial 3,200 awarded but unobligated discretionary grants backlog the Trump administration inherited from the Biden administration at the start of their term. The status of these 200 grants is unclear, and it is difficult to determine which projects are specifically at risk due to a systemic lack of transparency in federal grant funding.

These 200 grants may be at risk of both expiration at the end of this fiscal year or at risk of being actively cancelled for not aligning with the president’s transportation priorities. Considering they are not to be found on a list of approved grants, assume that the list of 50+ FY22 grants at risk of expiring and the list of cancelled grants could constitute part of the 200 grants with an unclear status.

Why is this happening?

USDOT has indicated for months that it planned to cancel grants that do not align with the administration’s policy priorities. Early on, we drew attention to these concerns, which began with policy memos indicating the intention to cancel obligated grants, a move that only intensified with continued scrutiny of awarded competitive grant projects. While the Secretary claimed progress as the DOT made project-by-project review of grants its priority, approval may not have come easily for grantees.

Getting a project sponsor’s grant to the new “approval” stage can be challenging for certain grantees. In order to get approval, grantees have had to change the scope of projects to eliminate equity-related provisions and agree to new standard Terms and Conditions for competitive grant agreements that conditioned aid on cooperation with federal agencies and allowed greater flexibility for the USDOT to cancel funds for any policy reason. As these new processes unfolded, we noticed a major slowdown in funding obligations for key competitive programs relative to the previous administration, all while the administration was touting progress on its new metric of approvals.

There is serious uncertainty around what exactly is at risk, brought on by the status quo opacity around federal discretionary grant administration that has been true across any Presidential administration. USDOT, under the current and previous administrations, has not been transparent or proactive in informing the public of the status of specific projects’ grant agreements but they have always been quick to tout award announcements. While the Biden administration maintained a list of awarded grant projects funded by the IIJA, it lacked important data on whether projects had been obligated or not yet. The true number of unobligated, awarded grants left at the end of the Biden administration, which Secretary Duffy stated was at over 3,200 projects when he inherited the office, was not clear to the public. As a result, the obligation of those funds has been left to an administration with vastly different priorities for infrastructure and transportation.

To improve transparency, USDOT should create an online, public dashboard that notes the status of each announced discretionary grant award under all federal programs, and include the status of any agreements between the grantee and the awarding federal agencies. To support transparency efforts, Congress should require that USDOT create such a tool in the interest of transparency and to ensure faithful implementation of the programs they passed and funded.

Enough should be enough

Right now, many members of Congress are not getting what they voted for in the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. If members of Congress and the communities they represent cannot expect to receive what has already been passed in law, why should you trust that the next bill will preserve your priorities?

USASpending.gov data showing zero new funding obligated to Reconnecting Communities Pilot program projects (CFDA 20.940) since January, 2025 as of September 16, 2025.

That’s why we’re asking Congress to hold off on negotiating the next surface transportation reauthorization bill until they can ensure that the previous one is implemented faithfully according to what is currently in law. Multiple grant programs under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act remain entirely frozen, such as the Transportation Access Pilot Program, which would have helped modernize the federal program by prioritizing access to destinations in travel demand modeling. FY22 and FY23 grant awards for the Reduction of Truck Emissions at Port Facilities program have been scrubbed from the internet. The Reconnecting Communities Pilot has received $0 in new obligations since January 2025, all while FY22 funding is expiring at the end of the month.

Congress should make certain that it is getting what it paid for under the previous surface transportation reauthorization before storming into the next one. Otherwise, what do you expect will happen to the next round of programs included in a bill that the executive branch does not like?