What will Trump's new homelessness executive order mean for California?

Yahoo

26-07-2025

An executive action taken by President Donald Trump on Thursday, aiming to push cities and states to remove homeless people from the streets, could make California governments' ability to secure Federal funding contingent on taking such steps and changing the state's current approach to homelessness.
Trump signed an order directing Attorney General Pam Bondi to seek to reverse federal and state judicial precedents and end consent decrees that limit local and state governments' ability to move homeless people from streets and encampments into treatment centers.
The move, first reported by USA TODAY, also redirects federal funds to ensure the homeless people impacted are transferred to rehabilitation, treatment, and other facilities, though it was unclear how much money would be allocated.
Here's what to know about Trump's executive order on removing homeless people from the streets.
More: In major decision, Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps
What did Trump's executive order say?
Under the order ‒ which the White House has titled "Ending Crime and Disorder on America's Streets" ‒ Bondi is also required to work with the secretaries of Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development and Transportation to prioritize federal grants to 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."
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, in a statement to USA TODAY, said Trump 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," Leavitt said.
More: The average American is closer to being homeless than being Elon Musk
What order may mean for California
In recent years, California has become a national poster child for the issue of homelessness, the challenges it poses and the difficulty governments can have with meaningfully addressing it.
The US Senate Housing Committee reported earlier this year that a recent homeless count found that just over 187,000 people were homeless in California. That represented a 3% increase from the year before, less than the 18% increase observed nationwide.
But it was still the highest homeless population of any state and accounted for 28% of the homeless people in America, while the state makes up just 11.7% of the population. The report also said that 66% of homeless people were "unsheltered," the highest percentage in the nation.
In recent years, California Gov. Gavin Newsom has made several efforts to help — and, increasingly, push — cities in the state to address issues with homelessness and people living without shelter.
In 2023, the state made $1 billion in funding available through grants to communities to address homelessness. A year later, urged cities to take action to make homeless encampments illegal in their cities and take action to move people off their streets and provide them with shelter and services. Earlier this year, he released a "model ordinance" that he encouraged cities to use as a template for passing their own laws banning camping in their cities.
"There's nothing compassionate about letting people die on the streets," Newsom said in a statement he issued at the time he released the model ordinance. "Local leaders asked for resources — we delivered the largest state investment in history. They asked for legal clarity — the courts delivered. Now, we're giving them a model they can put to work immediately, with urgency and with humanity, to resolve encampments and connect people to shelter, housing, and care."
Trump's order pushes for many of the same approaches and aims Newsom has advocated for, while making the government's eligibility for Federal grant money contingent on communities taking steps to get people off the street and into treatment and showing success in doing so. The order says that eligibility for grants will be based on cities and states' ending "housing first" policies.
Such policies emphasize an approach to addressing homelessness focused on getting unhoused people into permanent housing as a first step to successfully transitioning them out of homelessness. All California housing programs have been required to adopt a "housing-first" model since 2016, with a bill that would've ended that requirement failing to advance out of committee earlier this year.
On Thursday, a spokesperson for Newsom criticized the order to KQED, saying it was based on "harmful stereotypes and ineffective policy" in comparison to Newsom's executive order on encampments that she said had been based on the law and facts. But she also said that Trump's imitation of Newsom (even poorly executed) is the highest form of flattery.
Trump's action follows major Supreme Court decision on homeless camps
Trump's action comes after the Supreme Court ruled in June 2024 that that people without homes can be arrested and fined for sleeping in public spaces, overturning a lower court's ruling that enforcing camping bans when shelter is lacking is cruel and unusual punishment.
The 6-3 decision, split among ideological lines in the conservative-majority court, upheld a ban in Grant Pass, Oregon, prohibiting homeless residents from sleeping outdoors. Homeless residents of the southern Oregon city of 38,000 face fines starting at $250 and jail time for repeat offenses.
More: Homelessness rates jumped by double digits in 2024 as Americans battled to afford housing
In a statement, the National Homelessness Law Center condemned Trump's order, characterizing it as misguided at best, and counterproductive and dangerous at worst.
"The safest communities are those with the most housing and resources, not those that make it a crime to be poor or sick," said Jesse Rabinowitz of the National Homelessness Law Center. 'As a licensed mental health professional, I know that forced treatment is unethical, ineffective, and illegal."
"People need stable housing and access to healthcare," Rabinowitz said. Rather, Trump's actions will force more people into homelessness, divert taxpayer money away from people in need, and make it harder for local communities to solve homelessness."
Across the U.S., more than 771,800 people lived without housing in 2024, according to a HUD count taken annually on a single night in January. It was the highest tally ever recorded, a 18.1% jump than in 2023, when officials counted about 650,000 people living in homeless shelters or in parks and on streets.
Many cities have struggled to build more affordable housing in recent years, while some communities have pushed for harsher laws banning tents and sleeping in public spaces.
More: The homeless population is increasing. Will Trump's second term make it worse?
Trump has often expressed his distaste of homeless camps, singling out the removal of encampments on parks and federal land in Washington as a priority.
Trump, in a 2023 campaign video, said: "We will use every tool, lever, and authority to get the homeless off our streets. We want to take care of them, but they have to be off our streets.'
Other items in Trump's order include language that seeks to ensure that grants intended for substance use disorder prevention and recovery don't fund drug injection sites or illicit drug use.
The order also prohibits convicted sex offenders who receive homelessness assistance from being housed with children and supports new homeless programs to exclusively house women and children.
Reach Joey Garrison on X @joeygarrison.
Paul Albani-Burgio covers growth, development and business in the Coachella Valley. Email him at [e-mail].
This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: How Trump homelessness order could impact California
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