(Washington, D.C. – July 24th, 2026) Today marks the one-year anniversary of Trump's Executive Order on homelessness. In just one year, the order has become this administration's blueprint for destroying federal homelessness policy. 

Let's be clear: despite the myths and misdirection coming from the White House, the only real solution to homelessness is getting folks the housing and support they want and need.

But instead of using their power to bring down rent, fund vital healthcare services, and help people make ends meet,  the Trump administration is attacking homeless people and undermining real solutions to homelessness like housing and support. This makes homelessness worse. These attacks include:

• Attempting to rewrite HUD's funding guidelines to pressure communities into complying with ideological mandates rather than investing in proven solutions to homelessness, like housing and support. If implemented, these solutions would push at least 97,000 people into homelessness 

• Directing the VA and DOJ to pursue institutionalization and guardianships to strip rights from homeless people, including homeless veterans 

• Instructing HHS to retreat from life-saving mental health and substance use programs and invest in failed policies 

• Ordering federal law enforcement to take over Washington, DC with the stated objective of targeting homeless people 

• Encouraging states to pursue increasingly extreme anti-homeless policies, including a proposed homeless detention camp in Utah and a law that includes forced labor for homeless people in Louisiana 

Click here for a growing list of the ways Trump's order has shaped the federal government's response to homelessness.  

This order did not emerge in a vacuum. It is just one part of Trump's extensive racist and authoritarian agenda, targeting and dehumanizing people whom he mistakenly thinks are disposable. It is also the product of a concerted, nationwide effort to make it a crime to be homeless, led by groups like the right-wing, billionaire-backed Cicero Institute, an organization with deep financial and personal ties to industries that stand to profit from anti-homeless laws. The Cicero Institute undeniably has the ear of the Trump administration and played a direct role in shaping the contents of this disastrous order. As one Cicero leader said of the order, the Trump administration took our conversations, took our recommendations, and made something out of it.  

Despite the significant damage caused by this order, our movement has continued to fight back. From local communities mobilizing against laws trying to make it a crime to be homeless to a nationwide coalition of advocacy organizations, service providers, and local governments challenging this administration's attempts to reshape homelessness funding in court, we have continued to defend the rights of homeless people and advocate for real solutions. 

We know it does not have to be like this.  No one should be sleeping outside in the richest country in the world. Our elected officials must do their jobs and use their power to ensure that everybody, regardless of what they look like, what they do, where they come from, or who they love, has the housing and support they need to thrive. 

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About the National Homelessness Law Center   

The National Homelessness Law Center is committed to protecting the rights of unhoused people across the United States and to advocating for policies that prevent and end homelessness, ensuring that all people have access to safe and adequate housing.