U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said on Sept. 29 that his department is redirecting $2.4 billion in funding originally earmarked for California’s long-delayed High Speed Rail project to other intercity rail projects that require federal support.

The department announced it will be receiving funding applications for “projects that enhance safety on intercity passenger rail networks” through the National Railroad Partnership Program.

“This is the first of many Trump Infrastructure Dividends whereby recompeted federal dollars will be redirected from wasteful boondoggles to real infrastructure projects that benefit the American people,” the department said in a statement.

A total of $5 billion in federal funding is available, with $2.4 billion coming from repurposed California High Speed Rail funding.

“Our new National Railroad Partnership Program will emphasize safety—our number one priority,” Duffy said. “These targeted investments will improve the lives of rail passengers, local drivers, and pedestrians.”

The administration also said it would give priority to projects that improve the traveling experience for families by adding amenities such as nursing mothers’ rooms, expanded waiting areas, and children’s play areas at train stations.

States, public transit agencies, and national passenger railroad Amtrak are among the eligible applicants to apply for the federal funding.

Though the money is targeted toward improving passenger rail, some of it will almost certainly go to improvements on the nation’s major freight railroads because Amtrak uses their tracks for most of its long-distance routes across the country.

The funds are being directed at national passenger rail assets to “enhance safety, including grade crossing safety,” within the national rail network and to “reduce the state-of-good-repair backlog or otherwise improve performance,” the department stated.

The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) said that railroad crossings are important to address because more than 200 people a year are killed when trains collide with vehicles or pedestrians at crossings. That has long been something the government and railroads have worked to address, but it is costly to build the bridges or underpasses that allow cars to safely bypass the tracks.

“The funding will help advance FRA’s top priority of making railroads safer. These funds will significantly enhance and strengthen grade crossing safety, along with other eligible uses related to passenger rail capacity and reliability,” acting FRA Administrator Drew Feeley said.

Applications are due by Jan. 7, 2026, on Grants.gov.

The decision to redirect limited federal funds from California’s languishing high-speed rail project comes as the Department of Transportation pushes forward with its national campaign to prioritize solutions that reduce crime in cities’ transportation systems to “make transit safe again.”

Duffy has also threatened agencies that don’t comply with federal law and regulations with loss of federal funding.

President Donald Trump and Duffy have both criticized the decades-old California project for its cost overruns and many delays that have kept the train that’s designed to connect San Francisco and Los Angeles from becoming a reality.

California officials have said they will contest the decision to withdraw the federal funds from their state’s project. They had already filed a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s decision in July to pull $4 billion in federal funding from the rail project. The administration withdrew another $175 million in August.

“The FRA’s decision to terminate federal funding for California high-speed rail was unlawful, unwarranted, and is being challenged in federal court,” said Micah Flores, a spokesman for the California High-Speed Rail Authority. “Now, their attempt to redirect a portion of that funding, currently the subject of litigation, is premature. The Authority has been prepared for this possibility and will take imminent legal action to block this misguided effort by the FRA.”

The California High-Speed Rail Authority said in its most recent Project Update Report Supplement that it is actively progressing with construction in the Central Valley portion of the plans. The project, first approved by Californian voters in 2008, had a vision to connect San Francisco and Los Angeles by high-speed rail in three hours.

The project has since faced significant delays and runaway costs, with only 70 miles of guideway and around 50 railway structures completed. However, no section of the railway is currently operational, and its completion date remains years away. The original cost projection of $33 billion for the railway, to be completed by 2020, has ballooned to $128 billion.

The project currently has $28.16 billion in capital funding, while the Legislature is looking to approve a proposed $15 billion in funding in annual $1 billion lots through the state’s Cap-and-Invest program through 2045.

Jill McLaughlin and The Associated Press contributed to this report.