Decades of Evidence Show Housing First Works—Yet Trump Wants to Dismantle It in Favor of Failed, Outdated Models
President Donald Trump says the U.S. needs a new way to address homelessness, but advocates say the solutions he’s offered would make it much more difficult to connect people who are homeless with the services and support they deserve.
Trump has consistently attacked homeless service providers and the Housing First approach to ending homelessness. His recent executive order titled “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets” calls on the Departments of Health and Human Services and Housing and Urban Development to stop supporting Housing First programs. Instead, the order says the federal government should “promote treatment, recovery, and self-sufficiency” and increase support for faith-based homeless services.
These attacks are not happening in isolation either. Project 2025, the 920-page document compiled by the Trump-aligned Heritage Foundation, calls on the federal government to prioritize mental health and substance abuse treatment before “permanent interventions to homelessness.” It also describes Housing First as a “far-left idea” that fails to acknowledge that “resolving the issue of homelessness is often a matter of resolving mental health and substance abuse challenges.”
Some of Trump’s cabinet members have backed up his attacks on Housing First. For example, HUD Secretary Scott Turner said helping unhoused people “does not mean indefinitely subsidizing housing.”
Even though Trump’s attacks on Housing First have found support among his political base, advocates say Trump’s actions illustrate a profound misunderstanding about how the approach works and its effectiveness.
“This change will upend the progress that has been made across the country,” The National Alliance to End Homelessness wrote in a recent blog post. “The Executive Order represents a significant step back to a time when programs were rigid, with high barriers to housing that failed to meet people where they were and denied the most vulnerable the resource they most desperately need: a rapid reconnection to permanent housing.”
What Is Housing First?
There has been a lot of debate about what Housing First means. According to Community Solutions, Housing First is a recovery-oriented approach that prioritizes housing above other forms of treatment. The theory is that people are better equipped to address the root causes of their homelessness if they have a safe and secure place to live.
Housing First was pioneered in New York City in the 1990s by Dr. Sam Tsemberis and the nonprofit Pathways to Housing. This approach was considered a radical departure from the traditional “stair-step” model, where people experiencing homelessness had to enter into a treatment program before they were given housing.
The approach had bipartisan support from the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations and has been the primary way the federal government addresses homelessness for more than two decades.
“The shift came during the Bush administration, where they began to recognize that there was real value in addressing chronic homelessness,” Frederick Shack, CEO of Urban Pathways, a housing and social services provider in New York City, told CNN. “You can do that best by helping people address their core housing need and surrounding them with services.”
How Impactful Is Housing First?
Housing First is one of the most effective ways to address homelessness, according to research. For example, Denver reduced its street homeless population by 45% in two years using Housing First. Houston’s unsheltered population declined by 55% over several years, and Los Angeles used the approach to reduce its unsheltered population by more than 4%.
The federal government has also seen significant benefits from using Housing First. The Department of Veteran Affairs used Housing First to reduce unsheltered homelessness among military veterans by 52% between 2012 and 2022.
Not only has Housing First been successful at reducing unsheltered homelessness, but it has also improved living conditions and service connections for people who are homeless. For instance, 78% of participants in Denver’s Social Impact Bond program stayed housed for more than three years. Participants also reported a significant decline in the number of emergency room visits and police contacts.
Housing First has also been personally transformative for people who experienced homelessness. Rob Robinson, a housing advocate in New York, wrote in an op-ed for USA Today that entering a Housing First program was key to him finding a job that helped him escape homelessness altogether.
“The problem is not that Housing First doesn’t work,” Robinson wrote. “The problem is that stigma prevents proven solutions like Housing First from receiving the type of modest, sustained, national investment that will solve the problem.”
A Deep Misunderstanding
Trump’s executive order to dismantle America’s Housing First system shows a deep misunderstanding of the country’s growing homelessness crisis.
For starters, the executive order suggests that America’s homelessness crisis is caused by the moral deficiencies of people experiencing homelessness. Decades of research has proven that is not the case. Homelessness is a housing problem and is directly tied to the number of affordable housing units in a local market. A study from the Government Accountability Office found that every $100 increase in local rents correlates with a 9% increase in homelessness.
Trump’s order also assumes that America’s system of providing housing for unhoused people is ineffective. That is not the case. Many jurisdictions use a Housing First approach to address homelessness and have seen their unhoused populations decline because of it.
What America has not yet figured out is how to prevent people from becoming homeless and overwhelming the social services system. For example, five people become homeless in Colorado for every one person that is housed through its services. A similar story can be told about several other states as well.
Figuring out how to stem the rising tide of people becoming homeless is a more impactful approach than tearing down the Housing First system that is helping people escape the streets.
“What we’re seeing is a total lack of investment in solutions we do know work,” Lara Pukatch, the chief advocacy officer at Miriam’s Kitchen, a housing and social services nonprofit in Washington, DC, told CNN. “The executive order certainly doesn’t address issues of homelessness or make access to health and mental health care any easier.”
How You Can Help
Now is not the time to be silent about homelessness in the United States or anywhere else. Unhoused people deserve safe and sanitary housing just as much as those who can afford rent or mortgage.
Poverty and homelessness are both policy choices, not personal failures. That’s why we need you to contact your officials and tell them you support legislation that:
- Streamlines the development of affordable housing
- Reduces barriers for people experiencing homelessness to enter permanent housing
- Bolsters government response to homelessness
Together, we can end homelessness.