A New Approach to Homelessness

Summary

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Morning Wire – “A New Approach to Homelessness”

Podcast: Morning Wire
Hosts: John Bickley & Georgia Howe
Date: November 29, 2025
Guest: Michelle Stieb, author of Answers Behind the Red Door: Battling the Homeless Epidemic
Episode Focus: Examining the government’s “Housing First” approach to homelessness, its consequences, and a shift towards policies prioritizing treatment and public safety.

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Overview

This episode investigates why the U.S. homelessness crisis has worsened over the past decade, despite federal promises and massive funding. John Bickley interviews Michelle Stieb, a homelessness policy expert, to unpack the impact of the “Housing First” strategy, the roles of government at all levels, and newly proposed federal directives that condition funding on enforcement and treatment. The conversation exposes the roots and realities of homelessness and weighs new approaches favoring accountability and comprehensive support.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. From Faith-Based Care to Government “Housing First” (03:16–07:04)

• Historical Context:

  • Homelessness used to be largely addressed by the faith-based sector, with the federal government’s role expanding only in recent decades.
  • Pre-2013: The federal government funded diverse programs—shelters, transitional housing, mental health, and addiction treatment.

• Shift Under Obama Administration:

  • In 2013, the administration adopted “Housing First”: a policy funding only permanent housing subsidies/vouchers, not treatment or training programs.
  • “No requirement to engage in treatment ever. No requirement to work, ever. … This was rolled out without any evidence that it would work as a one-size-fits-all approach.”
    (Michelle Stieb, 05:17)

• Results:

  • Homelessness has increased by 35% nationally since the rollout.
  • The approach, intended for the chronically homeless, became the default for all, against evidence and best practices.
  • “Human beings need to be productive. They need to have purpose. And this policy, this approach completely flies in the face of that.”
    (Michelle Stieb, 06:13)

2. How Housing First Shaped California’s Crisis (07:04–08:34)

• California as the Cautionary Example:

  • California mirrored federal Housing First, dedicating all state and federal homeless funding to this strategy.
  • Since 2017, California’s homeless population has spiked by 40%.
  • Now, the state harbors nearly 50% of all unsheltered homeless in the U.S. and almost 40% of the total homeless population.
  • “San Francisco … Mayor Lurie starting to clean it up, Mayor Matt Mahan and San Jose really working to clean it up despite this mandate from the governor …”
    (Michelle Stieb, 07:55)

• Local/State Tension:

  • Some city mayors have become more pragmatic and conservative on homelessness than the governor.

3. Who Is Homeless—and Why? (09:21–13:13)

• Scope & Demographics:

  • Official HUD numbers (~900,000) are underestimates; real figures near 2.6 million.
  • “About 80% are struggling with either mental illness and/or addiction. … Within the female population, about 70% [experience] domestic violence. … 68% of our women had criminal histories.”
    (Michelle Stieb, 09:44)

• Mental Illness, Addiction & Lack of Self-Awareness (“Anosognosia”):

  • Many homeless are unable to recognize their own need for help.
  • The population didn’t choose this: “Not one of them raised their hand in first grade and said, ‘what I’m doing right now’. … They took a wrong turn, a series of wrong turns. They’re very sick. They don’t know how sick they are.”
    (Michelle Stieb, 11:01)

• Housing-First Fatalities:

  • Long-term studies (Boston) show nearly half of chronically homeless placed in housing without treatment died within five years.

4. The New Federal Executive Order: Accountability and Treatment (13:13–16:34)

• Biden-Trump Policy Shift:

  • Federal dollars are now to be prioritized for programs that integrate mental health/addiction counseling and transitional—not just permanent—housing.
  • Encampment clearing is mandated for federal funding.
  • “If a local government does not enforce the clearing of encampments and no camping laws or camping bans, they will lose federal funding. … Thankfully, [this] has some really big teeth.”
    (Michelle Stieb, 16:03)

• Compulsory Aspects (“Civil Commitment”):

  • Some severe cases may involve civil commitment for those unable to recognize their own illness or ask for help.
  • Early pilots: DC’s efforts to clear encampments; data on effectiveness still pending.
  • “Even if the data isn’t as fantastic at the onset … once people understand that there’s accountability … it’s going to start to really have a ripple effect.”
    (Michelle Stieb, 14:46)

• Impact on Death Rates:

  • Under Housing First, there’s been a 77% increase in the homeless death rate.
  • “It’s just been horrible.” (Michelle Stieb, 15:29)

5. Law Enforcement and Conditional Funding (16:03–16:34)

• More Stringent Law Enforcement Required:
  • The executive order ties funding to actual law enforcement and clearing of illegal encampments.
  • “It absolutely does … they will lose federal funding. It absolutely addresses this and thankfully, you know, has some really big teeth.”
    (Michelle Stieb, 16:12)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Human beings need to be productive. They need to have purpose. And this policy … completely flies in the face of that.”
  — Michelle Stieb [06:13]

• “California now has almost 50% of the nation’s unsheltered population… its cities have been ravaged by this.”
  — Michelle Stieb [07:47]

• “About 80% are struggling with either mental illness and/or addiction. … On top of those two, many of the homeless are also struggling with another disease of the brain called anosognosia. It’s actually a deficit of self-awareness.”
  — Michelle Stieb [09:44, 10:41]

• “This president has turned the battleship in the right direction. We need to lead these people into recovery and treatment. And it’s best for them, best for the general public, best for our environment, it’s best for everyone.”
  — Michelle Stieb [12:42]

• “If a local government does not enforce the clearing of encampments … they will lose federal funding. It absolutely addresses this and thankfully, … has some really big teeth.”
  — Michelle Stieb [16:13]

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• [03:16] – Introduction of Michelle Stieb and “Housing First” overview
• [05:17] – Housing First: “No requirement to engage in treatment ever. No requirement to work, ever.”
• [07:22] – California’s surge in homelessness after adopting Housing First
• [09:44] – Mental illness, addiction, and anosognosia among the homeless
• [11:01] – Chronic homelessness not a “lifestyle choice”
• [13:13] – Breakdown of the new executive order and policy shift
• [15:29] – “77% increase in death rate amongst the homeless under this policy”
• [16:03] – Conditional federal funding and enforcement of encampment clearing

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Language and Tone

The conversation is fact-driven, pragmatic, and direct with a sense of urgency and frustration regarding failed past policies. Michelle Stieb is empathetic toward the homeless but tough on the need for accountability and comprehensive care; Bickley is analytical and persistent in seeking specifics.

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Summary

In this episode, Morning Wire critiques the mainstream “Housing First” approach—which prioritizes government housing subsidies with no demands for treatment or accountability—and traces its role in ballooning homelessness, especially in California. Policy expert Michelle Stieb explains how new federal policies under President Trump (as discussed) aim to reverse this trend by conditioning all federal funding on enforcement, clearing of encampments, and integrating mental health and substance use treatments. The episode contends that only through a combination of personal initiative, community enforcement, and required treatment can the homelessness crisis be reversed—emphasizing that previous hands-off tactics have been disastrous for individuals and society alike.

Transcript

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[John Bickley]

In 2013, President Obama promised to end the homelessness crisis in a decade by rolling out the housing that provides permanent housing with no strings attached. Now, 12 years later, the problem has only exploded nationwide, increasing by 35%.

[Daily Wire Host]

President Trump is hoping to reverse those trends with his executive order to crack down on crime and disorder in America's streets and force progressive cities to apply more effective policies.

[John Bickley]

In this episode, we sit down with an expert who literally wrote the book on how we can actually confront and begin to correct course on the homelessness crisis. I'm Daily Wire Executive editor John Bickley with Georgia. This is a weekend edition of Morning Wire.

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[John Bickley]

Joining us now is Michelle Stieb, author of Answers behind the Red Battling the Homeless Epidemic. Michelle, thanks for coming on.

[Michelle Stieb]

Oh, really looking forward to our discussion, John.

[John Bickley]

So let's start with how the federal government has approached homelessness. We want to look at this big picture first before we zoom into some of these cities. It's been driven by a concept known as housing first. For our audience's sake, can you explain what housing first exactly is?

[Michelle Stieb]

Sure. And if, if I can step back a little bit further with context, up until a couple decades ago, homelessness was really addressed by the faith based community. Right. The federal government really wasn't very involved. But as they have in many other issue areas, they've slowly crept into becoming the largest funder of homelessness. And, and because of that, they drive policy. Up until about 12 years ago, the federal government funded shelters, they funded transitional housing, they funded mental health and drug and alcohol treatment. Along with that housing, they funded a little bit of permanent housing, too. And we're going to talk about permanent housing here in a second. But they really funded a variety of programs. And it was in the Obama, within the Obama administration in 2013, to be specific, that they, they said, you know what, we're only going to fund one thing now. And that one thing is housing subsidies, housing vouchers. We are not going to fund mental health treatment or drug and alcohol treatment or employment training. And we're going to offer this housing to the homeless, this subsidized housing for life with no conditions, none whatsoever. So no requirement to engage in treatment ever. No requirement to work, ever. No requirements. And this was rolled out without any evidence that it would work as a one size fits all approach. It was designed for a very small segment of the homeless population, the chronically homeless. We'll talk about that in a little bit more. But it was designed for this small segment, but without any evidence. The Obama administration rolled it out. They promised, he literally promised it would end homelessness in 10 years. And 10 years later, 12 years later. Exactly. We are at the highest point ever in our nation's history, an almost 35% increase. And the reasons for this we can talk about. But primarily, human beings need to be productive. They need to have purpose. And this policy, this approach has completely flies in the face of that. They never need to work ever. They never need to do anything to participate in their lives. And that's not how we are at our best. And this approach has just massively failed. And thankfully, the Trump administration has stepped in and said, we are at the federal level. We need to reprioritize mental health treatment, drug and alcohol counseling. It needs to be offered in conjunction with housing in multiple forms of housing. And we need to clear these encampments because these encampments have become so dangerous, not just for the individuals living in them. Pets are now overdosing, women are being trafficked, and there's spillover effects to the general public that have been devastating, including, you know, the pollution of rivers, the, you know, inability to go to parks because you, you know, you're not safe, the stepping over of needles, you know, as you walk to school with your kids. It has been a disaster on every level.

[John Bickley]

So you say there's been a 35% overall increase in homelessness. And from what I've read, it's concentrated in some of the, some certain areas like San Francisco, for example. How, how is that, you know, how do we see it distributed across the country in terms of homelessness rates?

[Michelle Stieb]

Well, let me say that California. So again, federal government adopted housing first as a one size fits all approach in 2013. California is the only state in the nation that followed the feds and said, all of our money on top of all of your money, federal government is now going to go to Housing First. California has experienced a 40% increase since 2016 when they adopted this, actually since 2017. So it's been a, you know, California now has almost 50% of the nation's unsheltered population, almost 40% of the overall homeless population. Its cities have Been ravaged by this. You know, San Francisco is really with Mayor Lurie starting to clean it up, Mayor Matt Mahan, and San Jose is really working to clean it up despite this mandate from the governor, Governor Newsom saying that all, you know, he is going to fund with the state dollars is housing first, which is massively failed. The state, the nation, these cities, it's just a mess.

[John Bickley]

So there you have progressive city mayors battling with the progressive governor to actually have more conservative, if you will, policies. Is this correct? I mean, so we actually have a battle where the governor is more liberal than the most liberal of mayors in the country.

[Michelle Stieb]

Well, you could characterize it that way. I would say it's a battle of effectiveness. Right. These mayors are sick and tired of, you know, saying to their constituents, this is what you're going to get. This is all you're going to get. And these mayors, thankfully understand that they need to prioritize treatment and recovery and clear these encampments. And we're going to see a lot of headway with them in partnership with the federal government.

[John Bickley]

Now, you've highlighted severe cases of homelessness as a major issue and something that people are really wrestling with. How do you actually address this? What are some solutions?

[Michelle Stieb]

Let me just say within the homeless population, and by the way, we're talking about somewhere around 2.6 million Americans, even though HUD says it's about 900,000, we can get into that a little bit later. But within the homeless population, about 80% are struggling with either mental illness and or addiction. They're also struggling within the female population, about 70% domestic violence, criminal histories, even the female population. In the program I ran for 13 years, about 68% of our women had criminal histories, largely because in order to feed their families or themselves or you know, grab a blanket or a shower, they had to commit crimes. And so criminal histories and, you know, lack of high school diploma and education. But the primary illnesses that accompany homeless are mental health, mental illness and an addiction. And so the on top of mental illness and addiction, if you are struggling with those things, there's also a disease of the brain, as is classified by cdc. By the way, addiction and mental illness are brain. They're diseases of the brain. CDC has labeled them that for decades. On top of those two, most, many of the homeless are also struggling with another disease of the brain called anosognosia. It's actually a deficit of self awareness. So they don't know how sick they are, which is why they are, you know, you hear them say, oh, I like it out here. You know, if you think about it, when all of these people that are struggling with homelessness were in first grade and the first grade teacher said, what do you want to be when you grow up? Not one of them, I would lay down on railroad tracks over this. Not one of them raised their hand and said, what I'm doing right now, right, they, they took a wrong turn, a series of wrong turns. They're very sick. They don't know how sick they are. And that is why this executive order by President Trump is so important. Because what he is saying is we need to use civil commitment to get them into treatment, to help them gain clarity around, you know, the diseases that they're struggling with and to help them heal and progress. And so you cannot expect this population, which is about 10 to 20% of the overall homeless population, you cannot expect them to self to raise their hand and say, I want help. Some might, but, you know, I. There's a study out of Boston that followed the chronically homeless struggling again with mental illness and addiction that were placed in housing that could ask for services if they wanted those services. In five years, nearly half of the cohort died because their issues were so severe. And they weren't. Those diseases that go untreated get worse, right? Cardiovascular disease, cancer, all diseases that go untreated get worse. And that's what happened with this population. It's the only long term study that's been done so far. But this president has turned the battleship in the right direction. We need to lead these people into recovery and treatment. And it's best for them. It's best for the general public, it's best for our environment, it's best for their pets, it's best for women. It's best for everyone.

[John Bickley]

You said, you know, lead them to treatment. There's also compulsive elements here for extreme cases. Can you walk us through what is this, this executive order? What does it actually, how does it actually play out in real life? How does this work on the local level?

[Michelle Stieb]

So it's very, it's very new. So we're just starting. You know, D.C. is kind of one of the first examples that, that we can point to. It's still going on in D.C. so we don't have a lot of results yet. But what the President is saying is if you, you know, for, with federal funding, we are going to reprioritize mental health treatment and drug and alcohol counseling in combination with more transitional housing environments. We don't need to give everyone struggling with homelessness a House, a house for life. We don't have to do that. We don't have the housing stock to do it anyway, and didn't when we put this policy in place. But we need to reprioritize federal funding to ensure mental health treatment and drug and alcohol treatment are provided. We need to clear encampments. And in order for communities to continue to receive those federal dollars, they need to be clearing encampments. They're not safe for the people living in them. They're not safe for the general public, as we discussed earlier. And so, you know, we watched in D.C. the encampments being cleared. We don't have any data yet on where people went and, you know, how many, you know, are in treatment and have stayed in treatment. I'm really looking forward to seeing some of that data. But even if the data isn't as fantastic, you know, at the, you know, onset, you know, once people understand that there's accountability, that they need to have accountability in the system, communities do. Individuals who are struggling with homelessness do. They're going to start to. It's going to start to really have a ripple effect. But it's way better no matter what the data shows. It's way better than what's been happening to our cities over the last and to our people. By the way, there's a 77% increase in the death rate amongst the homeless population under this policy. It's just been horrible.

[John Bickley]

Tragic.

[Michelle Stieb]

Yeah.

[John Bickley]

Now, obviously, this needs to be. Maybe this is my final question here. This needs to be coupled with an approach to law enforcement and to the criminal justice system that is more stringent than we've seen in a lot of these cities. Think of San Francisco, Los Angeles, where there's really lax application of the law. Does this executive order do anything to address that, or is that going to be something that has to be, you know, sort of coupled with other policies?

[Michelle Stieb]

Oh, it absolutely does. It says if a community. So, again, the federal government's the largest funder of homelessness, and they distribute most of that money to local governments to address homelessness. And if a local government does not enforce the clearing of encampments and no camping laws or camping bans, they will lose federal funding. It absolutely addresses this and thankfully, you know, has some really big teeth.

[John Bickley]

That's good to hear. Michelle, thank you so much for joining us. It's very informative. Appreciate the work that you do.

[Michelle Stieb]

Thank you.

[John Bickley]

That was Michelle Stieb, author of Answers behind the Red Door, and this has been a weekend edition of Morningwire.

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