Ben Carson has been under constant attack from the left and their friends in the media for the sin of being a conservative African American.
Carson cuts through all the noise and delivers the truth so they hate him for it. The sad truth we must face is that wait times to get public housing is soaring, hurting poor Americans who need it the most. Carson made the bold move to try and fix the system by removing immigrants from illegally getting access and the left went nuts.
“In a bold move, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson is both helping poor Americans and enforcing the law.” Newt wrote.
Some people in Congress may consider enforcing the law and prioritizing help for poor Americans (including people who immigrated to the U.S. legally) over help for people in the country illegally controversial or unacceptable. The solution for their position is for Congress to change the law. Until that happens, it’s pretty hard to complain that a cabinet officer is enforcing the law which Congress wrote.
Helping poor American families is the main mission of HUD. One lifeline HUD extends to vulnerable families is housing assistance.
However, 75% of Americans eligible for housing assistance – many of whom are children, seniors, or persons living with a disability – are prevented from receiving the aid to which they are legally entitled.
Millions of qualified American families are stranded on waiting lists that have endless queues – the average of which stretch on for years.
In L.A., California, the waiting list is more than 4 years long. In Miami-Dade County, Fla., thousands have been wait-listed since July 2008 – more than 10 years. In other localities, such as Orange County, Calif., and Orlando, Fla., Since 2015, public housing authorities have decided to simply close their waiting list and abandon new applications altogether.
Despite these waiting lists for Americans, there are an about 32,000 households occupied by people in the country illegally, who have no right to be getting taxpayer assistance. This is 32,000 households that could be occupied by Americans who qualify for the assistance but cannot get it.
In effect, thousands of Americans are being discriminated in favor of people who are in the country illegally – or are unlawfully receiving taxpayer aid they do not deserve and should not be getting.
HUD Secretary Carson has investigated this injustice and discovered that HUD has long been prohibited from granting federal funds to people who are not legally in the country. The prohibition – which Congress enacted, and Congress has the power to change – includes a mandate to end assistance whenever a leaseholder knowingly allows a person in the country illegally to reside in HUD-supported housing.
The rules constitute more than a mere functional necessity for law and order; they are a moral necessity for a nation that want’s to take care of its own vulnerable citizens. After all, public assistance is paid for and subsidized by taxpayer money.
But these crucial rules are easily skirted by a loophole that lets people in the country illegally who are living with qualified residents declare themselves “ineligible.” This means they don’t have their immigration status checked, and they continue to live in taxpayer-funded housing.
If Congress members don’t like how the law is being enforced, they should change the law. Until that happens, federal agencies, like HUD, should continue to do its own constitutional duty and enforce the laws as written by Congress.
Today, to assist agencies in the enforcement of the existing law, legal status can be easily verified through fast screening, using the SAVE system of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. This screening process is used by one-third of public housing agencies and needs only to be expanded to end the “illegible” loophole.
Last week, HUD unveiled a proposal that would require all residents living in HUD-supported housing who are under the age of 62 to be screened through this system. It’s a simple, egalitarian amendment that promises to restore proper enforcement and accountability to supplement the spirit of existing law.
As a result, the new measure HUD has championed is a great step toward protecting America’s forgotten men and women and promoting the rule of law. There is no legitimate reason or excuse to keep hundreds of thousands of American families waiting in line, when a lifeline could be extended instead.
