Overview:

Project 2025 and Agenda 47 promote a cruel and dehumanizing approach to homelessness, criminalizing those who are struggling, dismantling support services, and warehousing vulnerable individuals in “tent cities” to hide the problem from view.

Key Takeaways:

  • Criminalization Over Compassion: The agenda frames homelessness as a personal failing and a threat to public order, justifying punitive measures that punish rather than help.
  • “Broken Windows” Policing: It advocates for a “broken windows” approach, targeting minor offenses like loitering and panhandling, often used to harass and displace homeless individuals.
  • Scapegoating Immigrants: It falsely blames immigrants for homelessness, fueling xenophobia and distracting from the systemic causes of the problem.
  • Dismantling the Safety Net: Project 2025 proposes cutting funding for programs that provide housing, healthcare, and other essential services to homeless individuals, making it harder for them to get back on their feet.
  • “Tent Cities”: Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Agenda 47 proposes creating “tent cities” to relocate homeless individuals, effectively warehousing them in segregated camps with limited access to services.

Critical Quote:

“We need to get the homeless off our streets. They are a blight on our cities and a threat to public safety.” (Agenda 47, Social Issues)

Why It Matters:

This agenda would exacerbate the homelessness crisis, increase suffering, and erode our collective responsibility to care for the most vulnerable members of our society. It’s a cruel and ineffective approach that prioritizes punishment over compassion and ignores the root causes of homelessness.

Red Flags:

  • Banning Urban Camping: Criminalizing the act of sleeping on the streets, even when there are no other options available.
  • Defunding HUD and Essential Services: Cutting funding for affordable housing programs, homeless shelters, and healthcare for the homeless, making it harder for them to escape poverty.
  • Undermining “Housing First”: Rejecting the “Housing First” approach, which prioritizes providing permanent housing without preconditions, and instead focusing on punishment and forced treatment.

Bottom Line:

Project 2025 and Agenda 47’s approach to homelessness is a moral failure. It’s a cruel and counterproductive agenda that would punish those who are struggling and make the problem worse. We must fight back against this agenda and advocate for humane and effective solutions that address the root causes of homelessness, including poverty, mental illness, addiction, and lack of affordable housing.