Photo: A homeless encampment in the Skid Row area of Los Angeles on April 11, 2025. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times
President Donald Trump signed an executive order on July 24 that takes federal resources for addressing homelessness and redirects them toward rehabilitation and programs that tackle substance abuse.
The order, dubbed “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets” by the White House, aims to shift the homeless into “long-term institutional settings for humane treatment.”
“Surrendering our cities and citizens to disorder and fear is neither compassionate to the homeless nor other citizens,” the White House said.
The order directs Attorney General Pam Bondi, Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Scott Turner, and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to make sure states and cities that enforce prohibitions on open illicit drug use, urban camping and loitering, and urban squatting and track the location of sex offenders are given priority for federal grants.
The goal is to redirect federal funds to ensure that homeless people who are a “danger to themselves or others and suffer from serious mental illness or substance use disorder, or who are living on the streets and cannot care for themselves” are transferred to rehabilitation, treatment, and other facilities, the White House said.
The order did not say how much money would be allocated to the effort.
Bondi is also directed to end consent decrees that limit state and local governments’ ability to commit the homeless “who are a risk to themselves or others.”
In a statement to The Epoch Times, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the president is “delivering on his commitment to Make America Safe Again and end homelessness across America.”
“By removing vagrant criminals from our streets and redirecting resources toward substance abuse programs, the Trump administration will ensure that Americans feel safe in their own communities and that individuals suffering from addiction or mental health struggles are able to get the help they need,” she said.
Trump’s order also accuses “harm reduction” or “safe consumption” drug programs of “facilitat[ing] illegal drug use and its attendant harm.”
Last month, the Supreme Court overturned a lower court’s ruling that found enforcing camping bans when shelter is insufficient is “cruel and unusual punishment.”
The high court’s 6–3 decision upheld a ban in Grants Pass, Oregon, that banned public camping.
There were a total of 771,480 people who experienced homelessness on a single night in 2024, the highest recorded, according to a December 2024 report from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Several factors were cited for the record-breaking numbers, including “worsening national affordable housing crisis, rising inflation, stagnating wages among middle and lower-income households, and the persisting effects of systemic racism.”
More than 150,000 people, or one in every three individuals, who were recorded as homeless on that night, reported experiencing chronic patterns of homelessness.
This number has increased by 27 percent since data collection began in 2007.
Matthew Vadum contributed to this report.
1 thought on “Trump Signs Order to Redirect Federal Funds From Homelessness Toward Rehabilitation – The Epoch Times”
It all sounds possible, providing rehabilitation for the homeless. However, separating those who are a danger to themselves. And those who are a danger to others should never be in the same area as those who are not mentally challenged. It’s certainly going to cost the taxpayers a lot of money and using the wasteful money Trump has recouped thus far is a good way to start.
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