President Donald Trump’s executive order on the moratorium on federal eviction places the actual decision … [+]
After negotiations for another incentive package came to a head last week in Washington, President Donald Trump signed executive orders to extend relief in the meantime. One order would, according to the president, extend the moratorium on federal eviction.
The original moratorium, enshrined in the CARES Act, prohibits landlords as housing agencies from filing eviction actions, incurring nonpayment costs or fines, or giving notice of dismissal. It expired on July 24 and applies only to federally subsidized or federally supported homes.
But housing advocates are pushing back, saying Trump’s executive order to expand an eviction moratorium is in fact doing nothing – and continues to put Americans at risk of losing their homes.
Details about the order
Trump’s mandate does not in fact extend the federal moratorium on eviction. Instead, it calls on the Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to “consider” when an additional ban on eviction is needed.
‘The Secretary of Health and Human Services and the Director of CDC will consider whether measures that temporarily suspend housing from payers for failure to pay rent are reasonably necessary to prevent the further spread of COVID-19 from one state or property in another state to prevent State as property, ”reads the order.
In addition, the executive order does not provide new money to help troubled tenants in the pandemic. Instead, it says the Secretary of the Treasury and the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development – respectively. Steven Mnuchin and Ben Carson – can identify “any and all available federal funds” to provide temporary rental assistance to tenants and homeowners who have experienced financial difficulties caused by COVID-19.
In a White House press release on Monday, Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said the president “did what he could within his executive capacity … to prevent evictions of residents.” At the time of publication, officials named in Trump’s executive order have not released guidelines on extending the moratorium on federal eviction.
Housing lawyers are responding to Trump’s Eviction Order
Proponents of her case have been working to make the actual transcript of this statement available online. Proponents of her case have been working to make the actual transcript of this statement available online.
“The executive order he signed this weekend is really nothing more than an empty shell that creates chaos and confusion, and it offers nothing more than false hope to tenants who are at risk of eviction because they executive order literally does nothing to prevent or stop eviction, ”Diane Yentel, president and CEO of the National Low Income Income Coalition, said on Sunday during an MSNBC interview.
The House of Representatives included a more detailed plan to prevent evictions in its proposal for the HEROES Act. The proposal included $ 175 billion in rental and mortgage assistance and would replace the original moratorium on federal eviction with a 12-month moratorium on all rental housing, not just federally subsidized. There would also be funds to help homeowners help cover mortgage and utility companies, property taxes or other resources to house Americans.
Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) introduced the Coronavirus Response Extra Supplemental Credit Act as part of the GOP’s HEALS Act proposal. Shelby’s bills included significantly less money for housing assistance than the HEROES Act – $ 3.2 billion – and would be used for tenant-based rental assistance. Shelby’s proposal did not include language on extending the CARES Act eviction moratorium.
A recent report by a group of housing advocates finds that there could be as many as 40 million tenants at risk of eviction in the coming months. The US unemployment rate is currently at 10.2%.
Individuals who have difficulty paying rent may have help requests. Some cities and states have implemented their own eviction moratoriums – you can learn more about them by visiting the Eviction Lab at Princeton University. There are also options for legal aid, such as Just Shelter, which will help tenants who are with exposure to low cost or free.
Read more: What’s next for tenants struggling financially during COVID-19
