What are Trump's plans to tackle rising homelessness?

WASHINGTON - U.S. President Donald Trump last week announced a new policy encouraging local governments to commit homeless people to hospitals as a means to "restore public order".

The executive order, signed July 24, urges the use of "civil commitment", a legal tool by which the mentally impaired can be involuntarily placed in "long-term institutional settings".

The policy follows pledges Trump made before last year's election about forcibly removing the homeless and relocating them to "tent cities", comments that worried advocates, especially amid key funding cuts.

A landmark June 2024 Supreme Court ruling made it easier for local officials to crack down on homelessness, even while dozens of cities have since moved in the opposite direction and sought to create new protections for them.

All of this has raised concerns that U.S. federal homelessness policy prioritises criminalisation over assistance.

Here is what you need to know:

What's the scale of the U.S. homelessness problem?

A record number of people experienced homelessness in 2024, with more than 771,000 homeless on a single night that year, an all-time high and up 18% from the previous year, a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development report said.

It said the rise was driven by a "worsening national affordable housing crisis, rising inflation, stagnating wages" and "the end to homelessness prevention programmes put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic" as well as several other factors.

Harvard University research in 2024 showed half of Americans struggle to pay rent.

How will the new executive order on hospitalisation be enforced?

"The Ending Crime and Disorder on America's Streets" order reworks federal grants to states and cities to prioritise policies such as forced institutionalisation and banning homeless encampments.

It instructs the federal housing agency to link federal homelessness assistance with treatment programmes for mental health or substance abuse.

The order also mandates a change to longstanding federal policy known as "housing first" that prioritised getting people into housing before addressing mental health, employment or other concerns.

Donald Whitehead, executive director of the National Coalition for the Homeless, said the moves "ignore decades of evidence-based housing and support services in practice. They represent a punitive approach that has consistently failed to resolve homelessness and instead exacerbates the challenges faced by vulnerable individuals".

What else has Trump said about homelessness?

During the election campaign, Trump said he would "use every tool, lever, and authority to get the homeless off our streets" and build "tent cities" where the homeless could be relocated.

Trump said in a campaign video that violators of the urban camping ban "will be arrested", but will be given the option to "accept treatment and services".

"We will ... open up large parcels of inexpensive land, bring in doctors, psychiatrists, social workers and drug rehab specialists, and create tent cities where the homeless can be relocated and their problems identified," Trump said.

What has Trump done so far in office?

The president's moves to halt funding for diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility initiatives, to weaken LGBT protections and boost immigration enforcement have upended long-standing programmes addressing homelessness among trans, immigrant and other minorities.

In addition to already slashing jobs at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Trump's budget proposal for next year proposed cutting almost half of the agency's programmes for homelessness and affordable housing.

In July, lawmakers passed a budget that rolls back healthcare, food assistance and other safety net programmes, and are considering cuts to homelessness and affordable housing funding by nearly $1 billion.

When contacted by Context, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development said the agency was "following direction from the administration while also ensuring the department continues to deliver on its critical functions, mission to serve rural, tribal and urban communities and statutory responsibilities."

The White House did not respond to a request for comment. 

How far can Trump enforce his executive orders?

Implementation of the new executive order will now fall to state officials.

While homelessness advocates are concerned about Trump's plans for "tent cities", they say he has limited authority on this issue outside the district of Washington.

Indeed, Trump has previously considered forcing Washington to clear encampments, the Washington Post has reported, even threatening to "take over" the city, and in March ordered the clearing of encampments on federal land.

Outside the capital city, Trump can mandate what happens only on federal properties, meaning he would need to resort to other measures to force local officials to enact specific actions on homelessness.

But Joseph Cammarata, a senior lawyer in Washington, said the district was especially vulnerable to Trump's efforts as its unique governance status meant it was essentially at the whim of Congress.

Much would depend on how the policy is implemented, he said.

"If they en masse rounded up people in and around the streets without any reasonable suspicion or probable cause at the time, that would raise concerns of liability for the city," Cammarata said.

(Reporting by Carey L. Biron; Editing by Jon Hemming.)