Contact Us

Please see below for all email updates sent in February 2025. Feel free to reach out to Katie at kmeyerscott at homelesslaw.org with any questions or to be added to the email list!

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott <kmeyerscott@homelesslaw.org>
Sent: Friday, February 28, 2025 11:46 AM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Cc: Katie Meyer Scott <kmeyerscott@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: Mini-Update 2/28/2025

Hello!

There is a lot to report again – especially as the administration turns their focus to HUD and a government shutdown looms. I will provide a substantive update on Monday afternoon or Tuesday morning about all the things.

But for now, I wanted to share a few announcements:

  1. All organizations, advocates, and supporters in the DC area are invited to attend a press event on Monday, March 3 at 4:30pm at HUD headquarters (451 7th St SW, Washington, DC 20410) to join House Financial Services Committee Ranking Member Maxine Waters (D-CA) and other congressional leaders as they hand deliver a letter to HUD Secretary Scott Turner, demanding answers about DOGE’s efforts to fire half of all HUD staff, freeze federal investments in affordable housing, community development, and homelessness, and more. Please RSVP via this Google Form: https://bit.ly/41x7Tmq
  2. Also, our second Office Hours (with the ABA’s Homeless Youth Legal Network) is scheduled for Tues, March 4th from 3:30-5:00 PM. Here is the zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85357526614. If you’d like to download the recurring calendar invite, click here. If you plan on attending, it helps us prepare if you fill out this form but if something urgent comes up, feel free to show up without filling out the form. One quick note – we need to say “no confidentiality” because it is a shared space and we aren’t forming an attorney/client relationship with those who attend. However, we make every effort to make sure the space is a safe one to ask questions and can utilize breakout rooms if you are uncomfortable asking them in a larger group.

More next week – sending lots of love and care to those affected by the HUD Technical Assistance grant terminations.

-Katie

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott
Sent: Friday, February 21, 2025 2:17 PM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: Updates 2/21/2025

Hello all,

Thanks to those who came to office hours this week – it was nice to connect in person and helpful to know what you are seeing and hearing in your communities. Our next office hours will be 3/4/2025 from 3:30-5:00 PM ET. Calendar invite and sign up will go out next week. Also, I am compiling these messages on the Youth Homelessness Index website here: https://youthhomelessnessindex.org/blog/.

I almost have too much for one update so I will try to keep things brief – feel free to reach out if you’d like more information or resources about something. And as always – content warning, please engage with care.

Health and Human Services (HHS) Stop Work Order: Legal service providers who receive funding through HHS’s Legal Services for Unaccompanied Children program must immediately stop work. This will severely limit access to legal representation for unaccompanied immigrant youth. If you have contact with or work with unaccompanied young people, please make sure to check in with them and help them find alternative resources for representation in their immigration hearings. If you need help, email hyln@americanbar.org. If you want to stay up to date on this issue, sign up for emails from https://supportkind.org/.

EO re: financial “benefits” to people without “legal status”: This order requires all federal agencies and departments to conduct a thorough review of government programs to identify and end “all taxpayer-funded benefits for illegal aliens” (which it does not define – and there is some speculation that it might include people granted temporary protected statuses, parolees, etc. since undocumented immigrants cannot access any federal benefits except extremely limited emergency medical coverage via Medicaid; another potential concern is whether access to school is at risk, despite the Supreme Court decision in 1982 ensuring access for undocumented kids). Agencies will then be directed to take “corrective action” to ensure that federal funds are not being used to support “sanctuary policies” or “assist with illegal immigration”.

However, this EO in and of itself does not change current eligibility for federally funded public benefits programs, and does not change how any federally funded programs are currently administered. Changing these benefit programs would take an act of Congress.

BUT: There is a sense that this explains why DOGE sought and has access to taxpayer information – DHS Secretary Kristi Noem is seeking to deputize IRS agents for immigration enforcement. There has long been a firewall between the IRS and immigration enforcement and undocumented folks file taxes using an ITIN number (and tax returns obviously include addresses, information about family members, where people work, etc.). Now, there is a concern that those records could be used against people by this administration. Many young people we work with are getting ready to file their taxes and I am currently looking for resources for undocumented taxpayers who are worried about being targeted. Please let me know if you come across any!

If you want more info about the benefits side of things, let me know. We are in touch with some advocates working on this issue.

Section 504 attacks: A group of 17 states have sued the United States government, asking the court to get rid of Section 504 and its new rules that protect people with disabilities from discrimination in health care and human services (the case is called Texas v. Becerra ). Advocates are concerned that Trump’s Dept of Justice won’t bother defending the suit, and that protections for disabled students and for all disabled people in healthcare are at risk. See this site from one of our partners for more info and action items: https://dredf.org/protect-504/

Finally, strategy around responding to the attempts to rescind or weaponize the Equal Access Rule is moving forward. We’re keeping an eye on this page for rule change language: https://www.hud.gov/press/press_releases_media_advisories/hud_no_25_026I. I will make sure you know when there are any meetings or trainings re: making public comments!

A few other threads we are continuing to pull and will share more soon – concerns about HMIS data being used to target certain youth or programs and also planning ahead for what to do if HUD demands revisions to grant agreements to comply with the EOs. We are also hearing concerns (beyond freezes, etc.) that promised grant awards from HUD are not proceeding according to the usual timeline this year and CoCs are worried about running out of funding from last year as early as the end of this month or early next. Please reach out if your CoC is in this situation. The main strategy at this point is just bugging the heck out of your lawmakers about it.

Two bits of good news:

  • States are rejecting laws that criminalize homelessness, even in this current climate. Can’t share the most recent victory publicly yet but it’s a state you wouldn’t expect.
  • State courts are also rejecting criminalization of homelessness, even though the federal courts failed us in Grants Pass. Will share more about this soon, as well!

I came across a video by adrienne maree brown where she said “We have to remember the future is unwritten. We are not IN their story even as we are impacted by it. We have to remember to keep writing and living into our stories.” And it reminded me to keep working and building towards the future that I want at least as much as I am responding to the present. On a related note, I am making sure that I am inoculating against and challenging scapegoating of certain groups or people. Can’t remember what lovely email I read recently had this quote but it resonated: “If our base blames immigrants, trans folks, and other working people while the wealthy get away with extracting more from our communities, we all lose.”

More next week!

-Katie

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott
Sent: Wednesday, February 12, 2025 10:05 AM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: Updates 2/12/2025 (and introducing Office Hours!)

Hello all,

I hope you are doing well this week. I wanted to provide a few quick updates, with a potentially more detailed email later this week or early next as information and strategies become more clear. Also, content warning for the links in this email – casual cruelty, dehumanization, and erasure are par for the course with any quotes coming out of this administration.

Equal Access Rule (EAR): As you have likely heard, the new HUD Secretary has directed HUD to stop enforcing the Equal Access Rule, which required shelters and other programs receiving HUD funding to ensure equal access to its programs regardless of gender identity. However, not enforcing the rule does not change the rule and so EAR is still law. They will almost certainly try to replace the rule through the notice & comment process, which will be an excellent opportunity to slow down and gum up the works. More on that in the coming weeks.

Also on the topic of HUD, the ridiculous audit of grants and government webpages is continuing – and we’ve got some more info about what words are apparently forbidden besides the list of words related to gender and gender identity that have been circulating. It includes things like underserved, systemic, adversely, accessibility, disparate, inclusive, etc. We’ve also heard that they may ask some grantees to revise current grants to comply with the executive orders/list of forbidden words. Anyway, this doesn’t change the fact that young people who are black and/or trans experience homelessness at higher rates than white youth. So it is imperative that we figure out how to ensure these youth are being served in youth homelessness programs. We’re thinking through some potential ideas around guidance on writing/revising grants in a way that might get funded by this administration but still accomplish the goals of previous grants. I think we can be clever about this. More soon.

Identity documents: There have been rumors and reports of folks with nonbinary gender markers, who are in the process of updating or renewing their passports, having their passports held or not returned (https://19thnews.org/2025/01/transgender-passports-state-department/) and the State Department has essentially confirmed it. While passports with X markers are valid until they are replaced or expired, passports currently in process will only be renewed as M or F (and only if the State Department is satisfied with the proof of “sex assigned at birth”, otherwise the application/renewal will be suspended). ACLU is suing. And Lambda Legal has a really solid page with advice and how to get legal help for ID issues in general: https://lambdalegal.org/tgnc-checklist-under-trump/. Please share these resources with young people who need it.

Finally, what you may have heard about the dismantling of the Department of Education is very real and very scary. SchoolHouse Connection has some excellent information about it here: https://schoolhouseconnection.org/article/impending-executive-order-on-dismantling-ed-fy2025-budget. I recommend signing up for their emails if this is something you need to be in the loop on.

Finally, I wanted to let you know that we (the Youth Team attorneys at the Law Center – me, Jeremy Penn, and John Salois) are going to start holding Office Hours with Kelly Russo from the American Bar Association’s Commission on Homelessness & Poverty every 1st and 3rd Tuesday at 3:30 PM ET. The first one will be on Tues., February 18th – zoom info below my signature line (and calendar invite attached).

It isn’t required especially if something urgent comes up but if you plan to show up to the session on the 18th, please fill out this anonymous survey to give us a sense of the issues you want to talk about: https://forms.gle/6qbtoijGg1h781qi8 (and so we know how many people to expect). That link also provides some more info about the purpose and limitations of Office Hours!

Thanks all,

Katie

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott
Sent: Wednesday, February 5, 2025 4:58 PM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: RE: Quick update about funding and data/federal websites disappearing

Hi all,

Wanted to check in with a few more updates. I have added a few people to this email list but am still keeping it very curated. Feel free to ask to be removed at any time! Folks have asked if it is ok to forward these emails to colleagues and that is fine. I am also happy to add people to the list. Just please use caution and ask your forwardees not to forward further without checking in with me. And especially do not forward to anyone who is currently working in the federal government. We should assume those emails are being monitored by people we do not want in this conversation. Onto updates (and forgive any typos – I am releasing perfectionism in this time):

Data Retention – thanks to those who sent along info about this!

  • National Alliance to End Homelessness has saved a bunch of data, toolkits and resources from HUD, HHS, and a lot of USICH member agencies. They are coordinating with other folks to get a sense of what’s in the current inventory.
  • USC’s Neighborhood Data for Social Change was able to preserve some of the recent American Community Survey (ACS) and Census data before it was taken down (there are likely some other places that have preserved census data, as well – I am keeping my eyes and ears open).
  • Most of the CDC data they purged is still available in the archive – and there are efforts underway to preserve other healthcare related data.

For all of these, I am not sure when/if folks are going to make these repositories available but I will keep you posted. In the meantime, if you are trying to access something you need and can’t find it (already happened twice to me this week), you can try https://archive.org/. If you have the link you are trying to find https://archive.ph/ is also a useful bookmark – you can sometimes access articles behind paywalls this way, too. Of course, I encourage you to pay for good independent (and especially local) media but if, say, you don’t want to pay for a subscription to the Washington Post for whatever reason… 🙂

Resources

If you missed the webinar on it two weeks ago, here is the ICE guidance for shelters: https://homelesslaw.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/ICE-Guidance.pdf

What is Going On

As I mentioned in the previous email (pasted below for those who are new to the list), the concerns about DOGE control of the systems that affect both personnel management and funding at federal agencies are not overblown. Also, concerns that Elon Musk is essentially being given free reign to lay federal employees off, hold up/turn off funding, prevent personnel from accessing their emails and systems are also not exaggerated. There are currently legal challenges underway to this illegal power grab by…not even just the executive branch but by one person. Congress is also back in session this week and will presumably try to do something but some early efforts are being blocked.

After USAID, the next target appears to be the Department of Education – I am in touch with SchoolHouse Connection and other national education rights partners who are preparing responses and resources and monitoring the potential effects on homeless students, students in foster care, etc. We will also be looking for potential plaintiffs for lawsuits (i.e., affected people or programs – state AGs would likely represent school districts) related to any executive branch/DOGE cuts to education funding.

Speaking of which, we are still interested in hearing if any youth homelessness providers are having trouble accessing funding or were affected negatively by the funding pause or would be affected if it is reinstated (or if funding is paused in some other way) AND would be willing to be a named plaintiff in Democracy Forward’s lawsuit. National orgs, especially those who don’t receive funding from the federal gov’t, want to give as much cover to you all as we can and, trust me, will put our names out there as much as possible so you don’t have to BUT there is a point where we will need a few providers who are actually affected OR an organization that has providers who were affected as members to join the lawsuit. I’d be happy to speak with anyone remotely interested or could even connect with or present to your boards of directors if it would help to talk through the process, what it would mean to join the lawsuit, etc. My instinct is that the right plaintiff would be in a place with strong local and state support of their program to help mitigate any risk of retaliation.

Just My Opinions

Finally, I am speaking to you now as just Katie, private citizen, and not in my capacity at the Law Center. The advice that I am living by professionally and personally right now is – don’t comply in advance. What that means for me is persisting in calling and emailing my lawmakers, even though we don’t have the numbers to stop a lot of what is going on. I am going to be in their business regardless. Our local and state lawmakers can also do a lot right now to protect us and they are hearing from me (even when/if I think we are the same page, which is another lesson I am following – don’t just assume people are going to fight for us). It also means that I am still going to try to force this admin and all our elected leaders to follow the law, even when I am scared that the rule of law has already broken down.

This is also just my opinion (and not a very novel one as many are expressing the same!) but in trying to analyze what is going on, I stick by the mantra “follow the money”. Trumps previous tax cuts are set to expire this year. To renew them, they need to cut $4 trillion dollars in spending (or add that to the deficit). In light of this, it isn’t surprising that at the first opportunity they went directly to the systems that disperse the money. They aren’t going to find trillions of dollars in USAID or in deleting direct file or even in laying off thousands of gov’t employees. But they can use these efforts to test the system – will congress or the courts stop them? And if they don’t, then I do think the next targets will be Medicaid and Social Security. I hope that will be their downfall. But the hatred and fear they sow towards trans kids and immigrants might be enough to keep their base distracted and satisfied. As such, I do personally think they may come after youth homelessness funding if they can link it to their ideological agenda.

Thinking of you all – thanks for the good work you do!

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott
Sent: Monday, February 3, 2025 4:23 PM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: Quick update about funding and data/federal websites disappearing

Hi all,

I wanted to keep this smallish community of stakeholders in our State Index on Youth Homelessness work updated with anything I find out about what is happening with this new administration and any resources to help/mitigate/fight back. PLEASE let me know if you’d rather not receive these emails (and I will make sure you still receive any State Index updates in the future, unless you don’t want those, as well – no hard feelings 😉 Email overload is real!!). Similarly, if you want me to add someone to this ad hoc email list, please let me know.

My understanding is that personnel management of agencies AND the payment systems that disperse federal funding via the agencies are fully in the control of DOGE, the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (i.e., Elon Musk and his staffers). While the immediate threat has shifted to USAID (and some other agencies/departments) rather than across the board, I think it is useful to follow what is happening to USAID closely to understand the playbook this administration will use if youth homelessness programs become a target. If you know of any recommendations or resources in strategizing around this or direct actions that the youth homelessness field is planning, please email me and I can share them with the group. I will do the same as I hear of or help develop recommendations or ideas.

As for the issue with data and websites disappearing (generally any that reference gender), there is an effort underway to preserve data/resources from HUD for sure, and I am trying to find out if anyone is currently doing the same for HHS. More updates and where to find this preserved info soon. This is totally my opinion but I am torn between the instinct to download anything useful as quickly as possible and the fear that this will only attract attention to us. If anyone knows of any other efforts to preserve data at other agencies or best practices of how to do it, let me know and I will pass it along. I am vetting/independently confirming anything I hear or share so don’t feel like you have to be 100% certain before sharing something with me.

I also wanted to share a different kind of playbook – one from my org: https://homelesslaw.org/2025playbook/. It is more geared towards homelessness writ large and criminalization of homelessness but of course it all intersects with youth homelessness, too.

-Katie
  • Katie M Scott
  • February 21, 2025

February 2025 Updates

Please see below for all email updates sent in February 2025. Feel free to reach out to Katie at kmeyerscott at homelesslaw.org with any questions or to be added to the email list!

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott <kmeyerscott@homelesslaw.org>
Sent: Friday, February 28, 2025 11:46 AM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Cc: Katie Meyer Scott <kmeyerscott@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: Mini-Update 2/28/2025

Hello!

There is a lot to report again – especially as the administration turns their focus to HUD and a government shutdown looms. I will provide a substantive update on Monday afternoon or Tuesday morning about all the things.

But for now, I wanted to share a few announcements:

  1. All organizations, advocates, and supporters in the DC area are invited to attend a press event on Monday, March 3 at 4:30pm at HUD headquarters (451 7th St SW, Washington, DC 20410) to join House Financial Services Committee Ranking Member Maxine Waters (D-CA) and other congressional leaders as they hand deliver a letter to HUD Secretary Scott Turner, demanding answers about DOGE’s efforts to fire half of all HUD staff, freeze federal investments in affordable housing, community development, and homelessness, and more. Please RSVP via this Google Form: https://bit.ly/41x7Tmq
  2. Also, our second Office Hours (with the ABA’s Homeless Youth Legal Network) is scheduled for Tues, March 4th from 3:30-5:00 PM. Here is the zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85357526614. If you’d like to download the recurring calendar invite, click here. If you plan on attending, it helps us prepare if you fill out this form but if something urgent comes up, feel free to show up without filling out the form. One quick note – we need to say “no confidentiality” because it is a shared space and we aren’t forming an attorney/client relationship with those who attend. However, we make every effort to make sure the space is a safe one to ask questions and can utilize breakout rooms if you are uncomfortable asking them in a larger group.

More next week – sending lots of love and care to those affected by the HUD Technical Assistance grant terminations.

-Katie

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott
Sent: Friday, February 21, 2025 2:17 PM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: Updates 2/21/2025

Hello all,

Thanks to those who came to office hours this week – it was nice to connect in person and helpful to know what you are seeing and hearing in your communities. Our next office hours will be 3/4/2025 from 3:30-5:00 PM ET. Calendar invite and sign up will go out next week. Also, I am compiling these messages on the Youth Homelessness Index website here: https://youthhomelessnessindex.org/blog/.

I almost have too much for one update so I will try to keep things brief – feel free to reach out if you’d like more information or resources about something. And as always – content warning, please engage with care.

Health and Human Services (HHS) Stop Work Order: Legal service providers who receive funding through HHS’s Legal Services for Unaccompanied Children program must immediately stop work. This will severely limit access to legal representation for unaccompanied immigrant youth. If you have contact with or work with unaccompanied young people, please make sure to check in with them and help them find alternative resources for representation in their immigration hearings. If you need help, email hyln@americanbar.org. If you want to stay up to date on this issue, sign up for emails from https://supportkind.org/.

EO re: financial “benefits” to people without “legal status”: This order requires all federal agencies and departments to conduct a thorough review of government programs to identify and end “all taxpayer-funded benefits for illegal aliens” (which it does not define – and there is some speculation that it might include people granted temporary protected statuses, parolees, etc. since undocumented immigrants cannot access any federal benefits except extremely limited emergency medical coverage via Medicaid; another potential concern is whether access to school is at risk, despite the Supreme Court decision in 1982 ensuring access for undocumented kids). Agencies will then be directed to take “corrective action” to ensure that federal funds are not being used to support “sanctuary policies” or “assist with illegal immigration”.

However, this EO in and of itself does not change current eligibility for federally funded public benefits programs, and does not change how any federally funded programs are currently administered. Changing these benefit programs would take an act of Congress.

BUT: There is a sense that this explains why DOGE sought and has access to taxpayer information – DHS Secretary Kristi Noem is seeking to deputize IRS agents for immigration enforcement. There has long been a firewall between the IRS and immigration enforcement and undocumented folks file taxes using an ITIN number (and tax returns obviously include addresses, information about family members, where people work, etc.). Now, there is a concern that those records could be used against people by this administration. Many young people we work with are getting ready to file their taxes and I am currently looking for resources for undocumented taxpayers who are worried about being targeted. Please let me know if you come across any!

If you want more info about the benefits side of things, let me know. We are in touch with some advocates working on this issue.

Section 504 attacks: A group of 17 states have sued the United States government, asking the court to get rid of Section 504 and its new rules that protect people with disabilities from discrimination in health care and human services (the case is called Texas v. Becerra ). Advocates are concerned that Trump’s Dept of Justice won’t bother defending the suit, and that protections for disabled students and for all disabled people in healthcare are at risk. See this site from one of our partners for more info and action items: https://dredf.org/protect-504/

Finally, strategy around responding to the attempts to rescind or weaponize the Equal Access Rule is moving forward. We’re keeping an eye on this page for rule change language: https://www.hud.gov/press/press_releases_media_advisories/hud_no_25_026I. I will make sure you know when there are any meetings or trainings re: making public comments!

A few other threads we are continuing to pull and will share more soon – concerns about HMIS data being used to target certain youth or programs and also planning ahead for what to do if HUD demands revisions to grant agreements to comply with the EOs. We are also hearing concerns (beyond freezes, etc.) that promised grant awards from HUD are not proceeding according to the usual timeline this year and CoCs are worried about running out of funding from last year as early as the end of this month or early next. Please reach out if your CoC is in this situation. The main strategy at this point is just bugging the heck out of your lawmakers about it.

Two bits of good news:

  • States are rejecting laws that criminalize homelessness, even in this current climate. Can’t share the most recent victory publicly yet but it’s a state you wouldn’t expect.
  • State courts are also rejecting criminalization of homelessness, even though the federal courts failed us in Grants Pass. Will share more about this soon, as well!

I came across a video by adrienne maree brown where she said “We have to remember the future is unwritten. We are not IN their story even as we are impacted by it. We have to remember to keep writing and living into our stories.” And it reminded me to keep working and building towards the future that I want at least as much as I am responding to the present. On a related note, I am making sure that I am inoculating against and challenging scapegoating of certain groups or people. Can’t remember what lovely email I read recently had this quote but it resonated: “If our base blames immigrants, trans folks, and other working people while the wealthy get away with extracting more from our communities, we all lose.”

More next week!

-Katie

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott
Sent: Wednesday, February 12, 2025 10:05 AM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: Updates 2/12/2025 (and introducing Office Hours!)

Hello all,

I hope you are doing well this week. I wanted to provide a few quick updates, with a potentially more detailed email later this week or early next as information and strategies become more clear. Also, content warning for the links in this email – casual cruelty, dehumanization, and erasure are par for the course with any quotes coming out of this administration.

Equal Access Rule (EAR): As you have likely heard, the new HUD Secretary has directed HUD to stop enforcing the Equal Access Rule, which required shelters and other programs receiving HUD funding to ensure equal access to its programs regardless of gender identity. However, not enforcing the rule does not change the rule and so EAR is still law. They will almost certainly try to replace the rule through the notice & comment process, which will be an excellent opportunity to slow down and gum up the works. More on that in the coming weeks.

Also on the topic of HUD, the ridiculous audit of grants and government webpages is continuing – and we’ve got some more info about what words are apparently forbidden besides the list of words related to gender and gender identity that have been circulating. It includes things like underserved, systemic, adversely, accessibility, disparate, inclusive, etc. We’ve also heard that they may ask some grantees to revise current grants to comply with the executive orders/list of forbidden words. Anyway, this doesn’t change the fact that young people who are black and/or trans experience homelessness at higher rates than white youth. So it is imperative that we figure out how to ensure these youth are being served in youth homelessness programs. We’re thinking through some potential ideas around guidance on writing/revising grants in a way that might get funded by this administration but still accomplish the goals of previous grants. I think we can be clever about this. More soon.

Identity documents: There have been rumors and reports of folks with nonbinary gender markers, who are in the process of updating or renewing their passports, having their passports held or not returned (https://19thnews.org/2025/01/transgender-passports-state-department/) and the State Department has essentially confirmed it. While passports with X markers are valid until they are replaced or expired, passports currently in process will only be renewed as M or F (and only if the State Department is satisfied with the proof of “sex assigned at birth”, otherwise the application/renewal will be suspended). ACLU is suing. And Lambda Legal has a really solid page with advice and how to get legal help for ID issues in general: https://lambdalegal.org/tgnc-checklist-under-trump/. Please share these resources with young people who need it.

Finally, what you may have heard about the dismantling of the Department of Education is very real and very scary. SchoolHouse Connection has some excellent information about it here: https://schoolhouseconnection.org/article/impending-executive-order-on-dismantling-ed-fy2025-budget. I recommend signing up for their emails if this is something you need to be in the loop on.

Finally, I wanted to let you know that we (the Youth Team attorneys at the Law Center – me, Jeremy Penn, and John Salois) are going to start holding Office Hours with Kelly Russo from the American Bar Association’s Commission on Homelessness & Poverty every 1st and 3rd Tuesday at 3:30 PM ET. The first one will be on Tues., February 18th – zoom info below my signature line (and calendar invite attached).

It isn’t required especially if something urgent comes up but if you plan to show up to the session on the 18th, please fill out this anonymous survey to give us a sense of the issues you want to talk about: https://forms.gle/6qbtoijGg1h781qi8 (and so we know how many people to expect). That link also provides some more info about the purpose and limitations of Office Hours!

Thanks all,

Katie

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott
Sent: Wednesday, February 5, 2025 4:58 PM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: RE: Quick update about funding and data/federal websites disappearing

Hi all,

Wanted to check in with a few more updates. I have added a few people to this email list but am still keeping it very curated. Feel free to ask to be removed at any time! Folks have asked if it is ok to forward these emails to colleagues and that is fine. I am also happy to add people to the list. Just please use caution and ask your forwardees not to forward further without checking in with me. And especially do not forward to anyone who is currently working in the federal government. We should assume those emails are being monitored by people we do not want in this conversation. Onto updates (and forgive any typos – I am releasing perfectionism in this time):

Data Retention – thanks to those who sent along info about this!

  • National Alliance to End Homelessness has saved a bunch of data, toolkits and resources from HUD, HHS, and a lot of USICH member agencies. They are coordinating with other folks to get a sense of what’s in the current inventory.
  • USC’s Neighborhood Data for Social Change was able to preserve some of the recent American Community Survey (ACS) and Census data before it was taken down (there are likely some other places that have preserved census data, as well – I am keeping my eyes and ears open).
  • Most of the CDC data they purged is still available in the archive – and there are efforts underway to preserve other healthcare related data.

For all of these, I am not sure when/if folks are going to make these repositories available but I will keep you posted. In the meantime, if you are trying to access something you need and can’t find it (already happened twice to me this week), you can try https://archive.org/. If you have the link you are trying to find https://archive.ph/ is also a useful bookmark – you can sometimes access articles behind paywalls this way, too. Of course, I encourage you to pay for good independent (and especially local) media but if, say, you don’t want to pay for a subscription to the Washington Post for whatever reason… 🙂

Resources

If you missed the webinar on it two weeks ago, here is the ICE guidance for shelters: https://homelesslaw.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/ICE-Guidance.pdf

What is Going On

As I mentioned in the previous email (pasted below for those who are new to the list), the concerns about DOGE control of the systems that affect both personnel management and funding at federal agencies are not overblown. Also, concerns that Elon Musk is essentially being given free reign to lay federal employees off, hold up/turn off funding, prevent personnel from accessing their emails and systems are also not exaggerated. There are currently legal challenges underway to this illegal power grab by…not even just the executive branch but by one person. Congress is also back in session this week and will presumably try to do something but some early efforts are being blocked.

After USAID, the next target appears to be the Department of Education – I am in touch with SchoolHouse Connection and other national education rights partners who are preparing responses and resources and monitoring the potential effects on homeless students, students in foster care, etc. We will also be looking for potential plaintiffs for lawsuits (i.e., affected people or programs – state AGs would likely represent school districts) related to any executive branch/DOGE cuts to education funding.

Speaking of which, we are still interested in hearing if any youth homelessness providers are having trouble accessing funding or were affected negatively by the funding pause or would be affected if it is reinstated (or if funding is paused in some other way) AND would be willing to be a named plaintiff in Democracy Forward’s lawsuit. National orgs, especially those who don’t receive funding from the federal gov’t, want to give as much cover to you all as we can and, trust me, will put our names out there as much as possible so you don’t have to BUT there is a point where we will need a few providers who are actually affected OR an organization that has providers who were affected as members to join the lawsuit. I’d be happy to speak with anyone remotely interested or could even connect with or present to your boards of directors if it would help to talk through the process, what it would mean to join the lawsuit, etc. My instinct is that the right plaintiff would be in a place with strong local and state support of their program to help mitigate any risk of retaliation.

Just My Opinions

Finally, I am speaking to you now as just Katie, private citizen, and not in my capacity at the Law Center. The advice that I am living by professionally and personally right now is – don’t comply in advance. What that means for me is persisting in calling and emailing my lawmakers, even though we don’t have the numbers to stop a lot of what is going on. I am going to be in their business regardless. Our local and state lawmakers can also do a lot right now to protect us and they are hearing from me (even when/if I think we are the same page, which is another lesson I am following – don’t just assume people are going to fight for us). It also means that I am still going to try to force this admin and all our elected leaders to follow the law, even when I am scared that the rule of law has already broken down.

This is also just my opinion (and not a very novel one as many are expressing the same!) but in trying to analyze what is going on, I stick by the mantra “follow the money”. Trumps previous tax cuts are set to expire this year. To renew them, they need to cut $4 trillion dollars in spending (or add that to the deficit). In light of this, it isn’t surprising that at the first opportunity they went directly to the systems that disperse the money. They aren’t going to find trillions of dollars in USAID or in deleting direct file or even in laying off thousands of gov’t employees. But they can use these efforts to test the system – will congress or the courts stop them? And if they don’t, then I do think the next targets will be Medicaid and Social Security. I hope that will be their downfall. But the hatred and fear they sow towards trans kids and immigrants might be enough to keep their base distracted and satisfied. As such, I do personally think they may come after youth homelessness funding if they can link it to their ideological agenda.

Thinking of you all – thanks for the good work you do!

 

From: Katie Meyer Scott
Sent: Monday, February 3, 2025 4:23 PM
To: Index <index@homelesslaw.org>
Subject: Quick update about funding and data/federal websites disappearing

Hi all,

I wanted to keep this smallish community of stakeholders in our State Index on Youth Homelessness work updated with anything I find out about what is happening with this new administration and any resources to help/mitigate/fight back. PLEASE let me know if you’d rather not receive these emails (and I will make sure you still receive any State Index updates in the future, unless you don’t want those, as well – no hard feelings 😉 Email overload is real!!). Similarly, if you want me to add someone to this ad hoc email list, please let me know.

My understanding is that personnel management of agencies AND the payment systems that disperse federal funding via the agencies are fully in the control of DOGE, the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (i.e., Elon Musk and his staffers). While the immediate threat has shifted to USAID (and some other agencies/departments) rather than across the board, I think it is useful to follow what is happening to USAID closely to understand the playbook this administration will use if youth homelessness programs become a target. If you know of any recommendations or resources in strategizing around this or direct actions that the youth homelessness field is planning, please email me and I can share them with the group. I will do the same as I hear of or help develop recommendations or ideas.

As for the issue with data and websites disappearing (generally any that reference gender), there is an effort underway to preserve data/resources from HUD for sure, and I am trying to find out if anyone is currently doing the same for HHS. More updates and where to find this preserved info soon. This is totally my opinion but I am torn between the instinct to download anything useful as quickly as possible and the fear that this will only attract attention to us. If anyone knows of any other efforts to preserve data at other agencies or best practices of how to do it, let me know and I will pass it along. I am vetting/independently confirming anything I hear or share so don’t feel like you have to be 100% certain before sharing something with me.

I also wanted to share a different kind of playbook – one from my org: https://homelesslaw.org/2025playbook/. It is more geared towards homelessness writ large and criminalization of homelessness but of course it all intersects with youth homelessness, too.

-Katie