SAN FRANCISCO — Leading Democrats and advocates for the homeless are criticizing an executive order President Donald Trump signed this week aimed at removing homeless people from the streets, possibly by committing them for mental health or drug treatment without their consent.
Trump directed some of his Cabinet heads to prioritize funding to cities that crack down on open drug use and street camping, with the goal of making people feel safer. It’s not compassionate to do nothing, the order states.
“Shifting these individuals into long-term institutional settings for humane treatment is the most proven way to restore public order,” the order reads.
Homelessness has become a bigger problem in recent years as the cost of housing increased, especially in states such as California where there aren’t enough homes to meet demand. At the same time, drug addiction and overdoses have soared with the availability of cheap and potent fentanyl.
The president’s order might be aimed at liberal cities such as San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York, which Trump views as too lax about conditions on their streets. But many of the concepts have already been proposed or tested in California, where Gov. Gavin Newsom and Democratic mayors have worked for years to get people off the streets and into treatment.
Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court made it easier for cities to clear encampments even if the people living in them have nowhere else to go.
Still, advocates say Trump’s new order is vague, punitive and won’t effectively end homelessness.
Newsom has directed cities to clean up homeless encampments and he’s funneled more money into programs to treat addiction and mental health disorders.
His office said Friday that Trump’s order relies on harmful stereotypes and focuses more on “creating distracting headlines and settling old scores.”
“But, his imitation (even poorly executed) is the highest form of flattery,” spokesperson Tara Gallegos said in a statement, referring to the president calling for strategies already in use in California.
San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie has also emphasized the importance of clean and orderly streets in banning homeless people from living in RVs and urging people to accept the city’s offers of shelter. In Silicon Valley, San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan recently pushed a policy change that makes a person eligible for jail if they reject three offers of shelter.
Trump’s executive order tasks Attorney General Pam Bondi and the secretaries for health, housing and transportation to prioritize grants to states and local governments that enforce bans on open drug use and street camping.
Devon Kurtz, the public safety policy director at the Cicero Institute, a conservative policy group that has advocated for several of the provisions of the executive order, said the organization is “delighted” by the order.
He acknowledged that California has already been moving to ban encampments since the Supreme Court’s decision. But he said Trump’s order adds teeth to that shift, Kurtz said.
“It’s a clear message to these communities that were still sort of uncomfortable because it was such a big change in policy,” Kurtz said.
But Steve Berg, chief policy officer at the National Alliance to End Homelessness, called parts of the order vague. He said the U.S. abandoned forced institutionalization decades ago because it was too expensive and raised moral and legal concerns.
“What is problematic about this executive order is not so much that law enforcement is involved — it’s what it calls on law enforcement to do, which is to forcibly lock people up,” Berg said. “That’s not the right approach to dealing with homelessness.”
The mayor of California’s most populous city, Los Angeles, is at odds with the Newsom and Trump administrations on homelessness. Mayor Karen Bass, a Democrat, opposes punishing sweeps and says the city has reduced street homelessness by working with homeless people to get them into shelter or housing.
“Moving people from one street to the next or from the street to jail and back again will not solve this problem,” she said in a statement.
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Kramon reported from Atlanta. She is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
