The Trump administration has made a move to address homelessness with an executive order to bring back facilities to house those with mental illness or drug addiction.
President Donald Trump issued a July 24 executive order titled “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets.”
The administration says that chronic homelessness is often fueled by addiction and mental illness, which has led to safety concerns in many cities.
The White House stated that during the last administration, a record of more than 274,000 individuals were found to be experiencing homelessness.
The order pushes local governments to redirect the homeless to “long-term institutional settings for humane treatment through the appropriate use of civil commitment.”
Trump’s order tasks Attorney General Pam Bondi and Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert Kennedy Jr. to seek the reversal of any policy at the federal, state, or local level that blocks the commitment of those with mental incapacity or addiction who are living on the streets to “appropriate facilities for appropriate periods of time.”
The order also redirects funds to rehabilitation and treatment facilities, and attempts to “restore public order,” saying “endemic vagrancy, disorderly behavior, sudden confrontations, and violent attacks have made our cities unsafe.”
The order also directs federal resources toward grants and other programs to not only fund the facilities to house the homeless, but also to ensure grant money for substance use disorder prevention, treatment, and recovery only funds “evidence-based programs.”
Some critics of the order say the administration’s efforts would be counterproductive.
“Today’s executive order, combined with MAGA’s budget cuts for housing and healthcare, will increase the number of people forced to live in tents, in their cars, and on the streets,” the law center warned. The group said, “Forced treatment is unethical, ineffective, and illegal.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/what-know-about-trumps-executive-order-homelessness
