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Approximately 4 million people could lose federal housing assistance under a new plan from the Trump administration, according to experts who have considered drafting two unpublished rules obtained by Propublica. The rules will pave the way for many restrictions that conservatives have long been seeking, including time limits for living in public housing, work requirements for many people receiving federal housing assistance, and the stripping of aid from all families when the entire family is illegally in the country.
The first Trump administration has attempted and failed to implement similar policies, and new efforts have been working since the beginning of the president’s second term. The documents now obtained by Propublica explain how the administration overhauls the major housing programs that serve some of the country’s poorest residents, and carry out massive reforms that warn experts and advocates of weakening the social safety net amid historically high rents, housing prices and homelessness.
“These are rules that create huge amounts of difficulties for millions of people in communities across the country,” said Will Fisher, director of housing policy on budget and policy priorities, a nonpartisan think tank. “People become homeless, kids are pulled out of school and people lose their jobs.”
A spokesman for the Housing and Urban Development Authority, which drafted the rules, declined to comment.
The two rules obtained by Propublica are labelled as drafts and may be changed before they are officially proposed. At a meeting at HUD headquarters this month, Ben Hobbs, the agency’s Public Housing Officer, said the rules are under review at the Office of Management and Budget. (OMB typically reviews proposed rules regarding compliance with federal standards and consistency in presidential policies.)
The push to adopt the rules is part of a broader effort to roll back federal housing programs under the current administration. Trump’s budget proposal called for a 43% cut in funding for public housing, housing vouchers and other rental assistance. In March, HUD and the Department of Homeland Security announced a data sharing agreement aimed at so-called mixed-status families. It is not because some of this family are eligible for housing assistance, while others are illegally in the country or have other immigration status that are ineligible. Recently, HUD reportedly plans to require all local public housing authorities to identify such families with federal agencies.
From the perspective of HUD secretary Scott Turner, the work requirements provide a sense of purpose for millions of Americans. To many, calling welfare a “lifetime trap of dependency,” Turner and other Trump officials wrote in joint manipulation:
The Federal Housing Assistance Program supports over 8 million people by providing public housing or subsidized units that help cover the costs of rentals in the private market. In these programs, participants pay a percentage of rent (typically adjusted income) and the government covers the rest. Most of the people supported are elderly, disabled, or children. According to HUD data, the average family living in a public housing complex or living in a home receives benefits for less than $20,000 a year for 10 to 12 years and benefits for 10 to 12 years.
The first rule does not mandate work requirements and time limits. Instead, allow local housing authorities and landlords to implement them. Hobbs originally wanted the rules to request these policies, but HUD career staff persuaded him to be voluntary, according to a HUD official who is well-versed in the issue. The regulations allow local housing authorities and private property to impose work requirements and time limits on four major federal housing programs: public housing, housing selection vouchers, project-based vouchers and project-based rental assistance (the latter three are part of what is commonly referred to as Section 8). Residents, including both parents, may need to work up to 40 hours a week. The time limit is about two years shorter, and residents may lose their assistance afterwards.
Time limits also apply to families whose home’s heads are not elderly or disabled, with few exceptions. Similarly, work requirements apply to residents aged 18-61. Applies to patients ages 18 to 61, pregnant, young children, primary caretakers for university students, or other exempt categories. Housing providers may be able to provide vocational training or community services rather than traditional jobs. Housing providers implementing work requirements must provide support services to residents, but these services are up to the provider. HUD expects 750 public housing authorities and 3,500 landlords to implement work requirements or period restrictions in accordance with the new rules. Such provisions are likely to be adopted in more conservative regions of the country first, Fisher said.
The new regulations argue that they will promote economic self-sufficiency and release subsidised housing for millions of people who cannot receive it due to the limited amount of housing aid provided by the government.
Housing advocates and researchers expressed different views. “It’s disguised as job requirements and duration restrictions, but in reality it’s a way to strip families of their interests,” said Deborah Thrope, deputy director of the National Housing Law Project, an advocacy group. “This is a major departure from how the HUD program has been running since its inception.”
Approximately 4 million people could lose housing assistance, estimated Fisher, Slope, former HUD official and now a New York University professor, Katherine O’Regan. As a result, many of those people could become homeless.
Fisher noted that most non-disabled households receiving assistance already include one or more working people. However, because their work often has limited time and wages, even working families can lose their assistance as a result of the rules.
According to researchers at NYU, there is little evidence that job requirements increase economic self-sufficiency among recipients of housing assistance. Other welfare policy studies, such as Supplementary Nutrition Assistance Programs, have largely shown that job requirements do not significantly increase employment, but can lead to people losing help.
The second proposed rule targets mixed status households. Under long-standing HUD regulations, such families are allowed to live in public housing or receive vouchers, but the benefits are that ineligible members will not receive support and families will be able to pay more rent. The proposed rule would change it, with few exceptions, by making the mixed status family not qualify for assistance. They also require US citizens who apply for housing assistance or are currently receiving housing assistance to provide documentation of citizenship, such as birth certificates. The authors of the rules argue that HUD regulations will be “greatly consistent” with federal law.
According to a HUD analysis of rules obtained by Propublica, the rules could affect 20,000 mixed status families receiving housing support. Of these families, 16,000 children are included. They live mostly in California, Texas and New York. The average income for a mixed family of four is below the federal poverty line of $32,000.
This rule will allow families to maintain support if unqualified members leave. However, since most of them are families with children, the analysis reads that HUD expects that they will give up aid from the “fear of the family being separated.”
The HUD analysis predicts that public housing units may be left vacant in the first place as a result of the proposed rules. The analysis shows that regulations will increase government rental assistance costs up to $370 million each year, as they expel households that are subject to proportional allocations and replace households that are fully eligible with fully eligible households. However, HUD will not initially increase funding to local public housing authorities distributing assistance, so these authorities may have to provide fewer vouchers or leave units unavailable, HUD hopes.
The mental hospital will decline patients who need emergency care. The facility faces few consequences.
HUD hopes that the requirement for residents and applicants to prove citizenship and housing providers to verify it can create a new $100 million cost. Sonya Acosta, a senior policy analyst at the Centre for Budget and Policy Priorities, said the new obligation will be particularly difficult for homeless and low-income individuals to be eligible for assistance. “It’s very likely that those who need the most will not be able to receive it because of these additional documentation barriers,” she said.
The first Trump administration proposed similar rules in 2019, but received more than 30,000 comments in response. HUD ultimately did not complete the adoption process before Trump resigned. President Joe Biden’s administration retracted its proposed rule in 2021.
If HUD publishes or is proposed to the proposed rules, they will be subject to public comment. This must be considered by the agent before adopting it. This can take months or years. A HUD spokesman did not answer questions about when the agency expects it to publish and adopt the rules.
