The homelessness crisis, already exacerbated by Biden-Harris administration policies, could be set to explode if Kamala Harris and Tim Walz win the White House.
The number of homeless people has skyrocketed over the past four years, touching a high of 653,104 last year – a 12 percent increase from the year before. After 17 straight years of declines in the total homeless population, Biden and Harris have single-handedly reversed this trend.
The problem has been particularly bad for single mothers and children. One person I spoke with who works with the homeless and wished to remain anonymous said that most of the shelters she knew “are increasingly being populated with single mothers with children.” A priest in New York who also helps the homeless confirmed this observation. “It’s a remarkably high increase for a developed country,” added retired economics Professor Gianluca Frascatti, who called this data “a sign of crisis.”
Harris’s home state of California provides a particularly stark window into the failures of liberal policies when it comes to homelessness. Last year there were more than 180,000 homeless people in California – nearly 28 percent of the nation’s total homeless population. In cities like Oakland, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, entire neighborhoods have been overrun by tent encampments rife with drugs and crime.
This comes despite Democrat city officials, Democrat supermajorities in the legislature, and Democrat Governor Gavin Newsom pouring billions of dollars into “solving” the problem. In 2023, the city of Long Beach spent $60 million to address homelessness. The result? 71 fewer homeless people – a cost to taxpayers of about $845,000 for every homeless person taken off the streets.
In total, California has spent some $24 billion on its homelessness crisis since 2019, only to see its homeless population increase by about 30,000. The two primary reasons for this utter failure are the endemic corruption of California Democrats and the inherent structural flaws of the liberal approach to providing “affordable” housing.
As The Washington Examiner exposed last year, an entire cottage industry of nonprofits has sprung up to vacuum up the enormous resources California Democrats are doling out. Often times elected officials are getting kickbacks from construction companies contracted to build housing units. And the best way to ensure the gravy train keeps running is to ensure that the homelessness crisis never actually gets any better.
The levels of fraud and waste that characterize California’s housing projects for the homeless should enrage every American, not just the California taxpayers funding them. So-called “affordable housing” units now routinely cost more than $1 million. The city of Santa Monica earlier this year approved a 120-unit, $123 million project just three blocks from the beach.
California has largely followed the left-wing “Housing First” approach to homelessness, which prioritizes putting homeless people in temporary or permanent shelters as quickly as possible by “removing barriers” – in other words, by eliminating requirements that those on public assistance first seek help for the alcohol or drug addictions that in most cases put them on the streets in the first place.
Dr. Johann Walther, a former Swiss government advisor on health and pathologies, told me that this approach was a demand multiplier, as people see it as an easy solution without the need to refrain from wrongdoing, such as taking illicit drugs. “The road to hell is paved with good intentions, which should be a compass for this,” Dr. Walther said. “The government can assist temporarily to a limited extent, but the market must be allowed to step in.”
The results of these policies have been a complete disaster – so bad, in fact, that Newsom was forced to sign an executive order earlier this year directing officials to remove homeless encampments on state land. He has also threatened to cut off state funding for city homelessness programs, saying they “sure as hell shouldn’t get another penny if they didn’t use the money wisely.” (Newsom, of course, approved those programs and that funding in the first place.)
Minnesota, where Harris’s running mate Tim Walz has presided as governor since 2019, has a dour record on homelessness as well. The counties containing Minneapolis and St. Paul have a homelessness rate about two-thirds higher than the national average – despite the state’s bitterly cold winters. Since 2022, the percentage of people in Minnesota who have experienced homelessness has increased by six percent. From 2022 to 2023, the homelessness rate for families with children in the state increased by 27 percent.
Like California, Minnesota’s homelessness problem has been worsening even as Walz’s administration and Minnesota Democrats have poured endless taxpayer resources into “solving” it. Hennepin County, home to Minneapolis, spends nearly $200 million per year on “homelessness prevention” – only to have seen its homeless population steadily increase. Walz earlier this year announced $100 million for “affordable housing” projects eerily reminiscent of the ones that have already failed in California.
Americans have every reason to believe that a Harris-Walz administration would see the crises in California and Minnesota go national. The 2024 Democrat Party platform, in addition to touting the supposed successes of the Biden-Harris administration’s housing policy, calls for California-style government funding to “combat” homelessness. It also explicitly endorses “Housing First” – the same strategy that has flopped in California and other liberal states.
California, Minnesota, and blue cities throughout the country should be a dire warning to American voters. Tent cities, rampant crime, and a pervasive atmosphere of despair are the defining characteristics of Democrat rule.
Ben Solis is the pen name of an international affairs journalist, historian, and researcher.
