This week, President Donald Trump announced that he is establishing a task force to supposedly “Eliminate Barriers to Affordable Housing Development.” Abundant Housing LA will not consider a housing-related task force from the Trump White House to have any credibility on housing policy. 

The Trump Administration’s past actions on housing have demonstrated that they are not acting with a good-faith approach to make housing affordable. When asked about his recent proposal to “purge” undocumented immigrants that would subject 32,000 federally subsidized households and 55,000 children to evictions, Secretary Carson stated “You take care of your own first.” Before coming to HUD, Secretary Carson decried efforts to “fundamentally change the nature of some communities from primarily single-family to largely apartment-based areas.” President Donald Trump’s fiscal year 2020 budget request proposed to drastically cut housing benefits that help millions of vulnerable people afford their homes. Based on the Trump Administration’s history of deeply harmful policies, we do not trust that the task force will conduct legitimate research or policy analysis.

Abundant Housing LA joins our YIMBY allies in their distrust of the Administration’s motivations, and we share their concern that any Trump White House policies will ultimately be intended to reduce affordable housing. 

We will continue to speak on the need for more housing in Los Angeles, while bringing attention to well-crafted policies that will help increase the amount of housing overall, including subsidized and affordable housing; housing security; and tenant protections. We appreciate and welcome good-faith discussion with groups from different backgrounds and perspectives on housing. We are confident that constructive housing discussions will continue, locally and nationally, no matter how the Trump Administration may attempt to obstruct those efforts.

For these reasons, we reject any Trump Administration involvement in housing policy in the strongest possible terms.