DC Occupation Costs 4 Times More Than It Would to House Homeless

Thursday, August 28, 2025

Last week, when Trump federalized Washington, DC's police force and deployed the National Guard to occupy its streets, one of his main orders was to "end vagrancy" by destroying homeless encampments and arresting and forcibly relocating the people taking shelter there. But according to an investigation published on Wednesday by Hanna Homestead of the National Priorities Project, in collaboration with The Intercept, deploying the National Guard and "getting rid of the slums" is costing far more than it would cost to simply provide housing to every homeless person in the city.

Posted by qcp at 12:31 PM | 31 COMMENTS | permalink

Earlier this month, DC officials cleared tents along the routes the president frequents.

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-- Washingtonian (@washingtonian.com) Aug 27, 2025 at 3:55 PM

Comments

It's always a matter of choice.

The US could end homelessness and hunger and fund education and health care but instead it chooses war, secret police agencies and hate.

Billionaires are the reason why we cannot accomplish these goals.

#1 | Posted by Nixon at 2025-08-26 10:45 AM

With the way they're spending to achieve nothing, we'll be in Venezuela level inflation before we know it.

When the big show of authoritarian use of military force is over and the troops leave (as they will have to eventually) what's to prevent the homeless from just coming back?

Just like typical liberals, you don't care about the people, just the money. Trump deployed them to contain crime as the primary, and the secondary to do things to prevent crime from getting to bad levels again...like doing something about the homeless. If all he did was try to take care of the homeless, the crime would still continue for however long it would take to do something about them, not to mention that not all of the crime is due to the homeless so that effort would end up doing very little.

@#4 ... When the big show of authoritarian use of military force is over and the troops leave (as they will have to eventually) what's to prevent the homeless from just coming back? ...

Asked from a different view ...

Why is Pres Trump trying to reduce the symptom instead of trying to solve the underlying problem?

"Billionaires are the reason why we cannot accomplish these goals."

They couldn't do any of the things they have done and will continue to do without the "Useful Idiots" a/k/a theMAGAcult members.

#4,

Assuming troops will be sent home before Trump leaves office one way or the other is probably wishful thinking.

If this follows the playbook the administration seems to want to follow concentration camps will prevent them from coming back.

"If it once became general, wealth would confer no distinction".

-Orwell

The rich won't spend money on the poor. If they did, how would the rich have any power?

Assuming troops will be sent home before Trump leaves office one way or the other is probably wishful thinking.

Not really "assuming " but keeping troops in DC forever seems problematic. Even keeping them there for 3 years is going to be difficult to justify the costs alone. It's already been determined that it would have been cheaper to house the homeless then support a military occupation.

3 years is a long time.

Pretty sure we will all be OBE by then.

(Overcome By Events)

Not really "assuming " but keeping troops in DC forever seems problematic.

He also wants to occupy Baltimore and Chicago.

3 years is a long time.

Three years may just be the prelude.

And to whom does Trump have to justify anything currently?

@#12

It looks like Pres Trump is trying to "normalize" the use of the military against Americans, especially those who live in Democrat-leaning areas.

Will Pres Trump have the military stationed around blue-state voting sites in 2026 to to intimidate voters in those areas?

Doubtful as to cost cheaper to house the homeless, as who is going to pay the cost of building/buying housing in that expensive area, ongoing utilities bills, high insurance for damages if any insurance would insure housing for such individuals, etc.

From the article: Governors from six US states have sent troops to Washington to help Trump's effort, swelling the ranks to nearly 2,100 who will soon be on patrol.

According to previous reporting, National Guard deployments cost the US government $530 per guard member each day. Using that figure, Homestead estimated that it would cost just over $1.1 million.

She added that "the number of troops will likely continue to grow. And with no deadline for the DC deployment, those costs could add up for months or even years."

According to the most recent data from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), there are about 5,600 people experiencing either sheltered and unsheltered homelessness in DC on a given night. Operating an affordable housing unit for each one of them, the data shows, costs about $45.44 per person, per day, on average in DC.

Providing affordable housing to every homeless person in DC would cost an estimated $255,166, which is 4.3 times less than the cost of Trump's military deployment.

From a link in the cited article ...

FACT SHEET: Taxpayer Trade Offs: D.C. Occupation vs. Public Housing
ips-dc.org

... As of this writing (August 21, 2025), there are more than 2,000 National Guard troops deployed in D.C., costing over a million dollars per day.

In all but two states, the daily cost of the D.C. troop deployment is greater than the daily cost of operating public housing for all unhoused people in the state.

In most cases, the disparity is many times greater. For example, the daily expense of deploying troops to D.C. is 4.3 times greater than the daily cost of operating public housing for D.C's entire unhoused population. ...

Per-state table, and references cited.

Why is Pres Trump trying to reduce the symptom instead of trying to solve the underlying problem?

Lewzer doesn't care about homeless people. He just doesn't want to see them from his motorcade when he's off to shovel more taxpayer money into his golf resort.

-Two U.S. officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said it cost about $530 per Guard member, per day to be deployed.

maybe we could verify that cost if we cared enough.

Trump is a sadist. He wants to see them drag some unfortunate black or Hispanic homeless guy to the middle of the street and beat the crap out of him.

The national guard has been deployed in DC so it becomes normalized.

So when Trump announces he's canceling the midterms, they'll already be in place to fend off protesters.

It's why he's nullified the first Amendment's protection to burn the American flag, so should anyone protest what America is becoming, a fascist nation, he can arrest them.

Fascism has taken over the Republican Party and it's trying its best to take over the rest of America.

"Western liberalism is obsolete."
-Vladimir Putin.

www.bbc.com

Take five minutes to read that article. It's from 2019, but you wouldn't know it since our very own Deplorable MAGA contributors are saying the same things Putin did, verbatim.

"This liberal idea presupposes that nothing needs to be done. That migrants can kill, plunder and rape with impunity because their rights as migrants have to be protected."

-Putin, 2019 and MAGA, 2025

Pretty sure I've read OneNut post that exact sentiment, nearly word for word.

Except he probably used the word "lumper".

Probably something to do with all the tumors he's got in his brain.

Money sent to Ukraine could have bought healthcare for everybody.

Money sent to isreaol could have ended homelessness.

@#23 ... Money sent to Ukraine could have bought healthcare for everybody. ...

But that money, and arms, are buying freedom for a Democracy.

But, so long as your current alias went there ...

What is Pres Trump Big Beautiful Bill buying for healthcare for US citizens?

That bill intentionally seems to be degrading the healthcare available for Americans, in favor of giving a significant tax cut to billionaires.

Too many of the homeless and others are not interested in living in a home and working and being responsible for their own well being. Their minds are shot and unable to live and work. Too many drugs. Institutionalize them and keep them off the streets.

@#25 ... Too many of the homeless and others are not interested in living in a home and working and being responsible for their own well being. ...

... and your current alias knows that... how?

Got links?

Regarding links, I see this ...

$750 a month was given to homeless people in California. What they reported spending it on is more evidence that universal basic income works. (2023)
www.businessinsider.com

... About 100 homeless people in California's Los Angeles County and San Francisco Bay Area were given $750 a month for a year " no questions asked.

The newly released results of the first six months of the study on the impact of basic income and social support intervention show how the recipients spent the influx of cash.

The findings appear to be the latest piece of evidence showing the benefits of a basic-income plan.

The study found that after six months, those who received the $750 monthly stipend were less likely to report being unsheltered and said they were closer to having enough money to meet all of their basic needs compared with a control group of people who accessed usual homeless services. ...

#25 & #26

both are true. The issue is each 'team' uses their preferred fact to dunk on the other, rather than realize that this isn't a one solution issue.

Some of the homeless do need institutional help to ever have a chance of recovering, while some just need a cash break to get out of the cycle they're in.

Giving money to the prior is wasting money, and vice versa for the other group.

But why look at the issue intelligently when we can own the dems/repubs, isn't that way more satisfying?

Some of the homeless do need institutional help to ever have a chance of recovering, while some just need a cash break to get out of the cycle they're in.
#28 | Posted by kwrx25

Democrats support both.
Republicans support neither.
That's why we have neither.

Too many of the homeless and others are not interested in living in a home and working and being responsible for their own well being.

This is because they are unsafe.

California passed a law to fix unsafe homeless shelters. Cities and counties are ignoring it
calmatters.org

... and your current alias knows that... how?
Got links?
#26 | POSTED BY LAMPLIGHTER

You wouldn't care if he did, similar to Snoofy.

#28 | POSTED BY KWRX25

This is a nice statement, but it ignores the reality. The Democrats prefer to give money to large NGOs than actually fix the problem.
NGO's employees are paid alot of money. But if they fixed the problem the NGO would disappear. This was also true for illegal immigration.
So we must have more of it and spend more to get less results.

You can't blame Republicans BILLIONS have been "spent" on homelessness in California. Some call it an industrial complex.
Local Governments are free to try your experiments but the problem the current structure wouldn't allow it, would lobby against it.
You can blame this on Republicans, but California is nothing but a Democrat experiment and its failing horribly.

Here's a book for you to understand why its more complicated than Republican or Democrat talking points.

Why Nothing Works: Who Killed Progress and How to Bring It Back
www.amazon.com

As a foreigner I am always amazed at how little Americans understand their history, and how they got here.