How Trump's D.C. takeover criminalizes homelessness

Code Switch

NPR

Society & Culture

4.6 • 14.5K Ratings

🗓️ 20 August 2025

⏱️ 41 minutes

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Summary

On August 11, President Trump announced his intention to "rescue" the nation's capital. A central feature of his plan involved using federal officials to remove people experiencing homelessness from the city — people that he listed alongside "violent gangs, bloodthirsty criminals, roving mobs of wild youth, and drugged out maniacs." On this episode, we're diving into what it means to criminalize homelessness, what it looks like when police officers are used to solve social problems, and what this D.C. takeover might portend for the rest of the country.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for NPR comes from NPR member stations and Eric and Wendy Schmidt through the Schmidt Family Foundation, working toward a healthy, resilient, secure world for all.
0:11.5	On the web at theshmit.org.
0:15.8	What's good? You are listening to Code Twitch. I'm Gene Demby.
0:19.7	And I want to talk about what's happening in Washington, D.C., where I live right now.
0:25.0	President Trump temporarily federalized the D.C. Metro Police and brought in the National Guard to tackle what he describes as the city's quote,
0:33.6	Crime, bloodshed, bedlam, and squalor and worse.
0:38.3	And to do that, I want to go back a few years to a place on the other side of the country from D.C.
0:44.6	It's called Grant's Pass.
0:47.6	Grants Pass is a small town in Oregon that is similar to many small towns across the country.
0:53.0	There are a lot of people there who just can't afford
0:55.1	to make ends meet. That's Jesse Rabinowitz. And I'm the Campaign and Communications Director
1:00.2	at the National Homelessness Law Center. And Jesse says there was only a 1% vacancy rate in
1:06.5	Grants Pass. That means there was just no housing available for anybody who was looking and no housing,
1:12.4	importantly, that people could afford.
1:14.6	About half the people in grants pass pay more than they can afford for rent, which is actually
1:18.3	true across the country as well.
1:20.5	And when people can't afford housing and when there's no housing, people live outside.
1:25.2	In that town of about 40,000 people, almost 600 folks were experiencing homelessness
1:32.1	at any given time. And Jesse said there was no traditional homeless shelter in Grants Pass.
1:38.1	There's a Christian gospel rescue mission, but that required people to do things like
1:42.5	attend Christian worship services.
1:44.7	Required people to abstain from drug, sex, and alcohol, required people to pay money to stay there,
	...

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