Shamus Roller

Why you might not know that 2024 was America's safest year since the 1960s An overwhelming majority of Americans, 64 percent, believe that crime increased across the country in 2024, according to a Gallup survey conducted late last year.

1. This week, the FBI released its comprehensive crime report for 2024, which revealed that both VIOLENT CRIME and PROPERTY CRIME reached their LOWEST LEVELS SINCE THE 1960s

This a massive story. But you might not have heard about it, even if you follow the news closely.

Here's why.

Every state has a process to remove squatters but the hysteria produced a number of state laws that undermine tenants rights in important ways and provide tools for unscrupulous landlords to evict tenants for no reason.

Atlanta tenants say they’re being wrongly labeled as squatters amid unsafe living conditions On Friday, some tenants returned home to find their belongings outside.

The squatter hysteria from last year is starting to produce what was always intended by the real estate industry - lawful tenants are being removed because they don't have a written lease. www.wsbtv.com/news/local/a...

They All Signed the “Harper’s” Letter. Where Are They Now? Many of those who were loudest in denouncing cancel culture then are now curiously silent in the face of Donald Trump’s assaults on free speech.

For the June issue of @thenation.com, I wrote about the Harper’s letter 5 years later, and how under a quarter of its signatories have spoken out about Mahmoud Khalil and other campus activists imprisoned for speech.

Disrupting the Eviction System: Tenant Right to Counsel As a growing number of jurisdictions consider adopting RTC—and as researchers seek to analyze the effects of such programs—it is critical to understand their challenges and the keys to their success. ...

New Study 🔔:

More than 7M Americans face eviction each year. But if they go to court, most do it alone, without a lawyer.

Our researchers studied the initiatives that are trying to change this reality, known as Right to Counsel programs or RTC.

evictionlab.org/disrupting-t...

MADISON, Wis. – Yesterday, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel and other publications reported that Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan apparently attempted to protect a defendant from ICE agents trying to detain that defendant. (1/6)

I got to meet Dolores Huerta yesterday. Doesn't get much better than that.

We're fighting for a different future Email from The National Housing Law Project Dear Friends of NHLP, I’m writing to you on the cusp of Fair Housing Month. April commemorates the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1968, and the promise

This Fair Housing Month we are defending hard-won protections. At @NHLP we’re fighting for a different future. While this moment is hard, we must imagine & build a housing system that puts people over profit. Read more of our thoughts here: conta.cc/3FDXnSa

Mass Layoffs Hit Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (Gift Article) The agency, which has returned $21 billion to consumers since its inception, could lose 1,500 of its 1,700 employees, a union warned.

The CFPB was created in the wake of the Great Recession and the foreclosure crisis - to help prevent a crisis like that from happening again and to protect us - consumers. Bring on the predatory lenders - just what we all needed.
www.nytimes.com/2025/04/17/u...

I hope that Congress ignores Trump's budget proposals much like they did in the first term but there's less spine in Congress this time around. Decimating the voucher program would make all of our lives worse.

Trump DEI Purge Hits Affordable Housing Groups Millions of dollars in affordable housing contracts were canceled after a DOGE review of their websites and social media for terms linked to equity and diversity.

In February, DOGE took screenshots of affordable housing providers' websites and LinkedIn profiles that showed terms associated with diversity and equity — then canceled millions of dollars in contracts with those groups.

That funding was just reinstated on appeal: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Details from Karl Marx-Hof

In Vienna studying social housing. Starting with the grandma of them all.

Big Law Is Winning in Court—Now Is Not the Time to Fold | Common Dreams The law firms fighting back against Trump’s executive orders are winning, and those cutting deals with the White House are suffering irreparable damage behind the scenes.

Relman Colfax founder John Relman on the attacks on lawyers and why to fight. www.commondreams.org/opinion/big-...

And now it’s back up again. HUD.gov

And … the HUD website is down.

Republicans Once Championed Free Speech on Campus. Now, Not So Much. President Trump and state politicians are pushing new laws and policies that crack down on curriculum, protests and speakers.

Many conservatives who fought against cancel culture on college campuses and championed free speech are now behind a growing crackdown on political expression at universities, in ways that try to sidestep the Constitution’s free-speech guarantees.

Before the mass firings, this Georgia-based federal worker prevented housing discrimination in the Southeast Included in the ongoing purge of federal workers by the Trump administration were employees at the Atlanta regional office of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. One federal worker's...

Chris Bergquist worked in HUD’s Fair Housing office.

One of his first cases: a disabled woman who couldn’t shower because her landlord refused to make her unit wheelchair accessible. His team forced compliance.

Now he’s been fired in Trump’s purge—as Fair Housing staff face 76.5% cuts nationwide.

Left for Dead, the C.F.P.B. Inches Back to Life Court orders have paused, and at times reversed, the Trump administration’s efforts to shut down the consumer watchdog agency.

What’s at risk with CFPB: “Last week, the agency’s consumer response team was called back to work to tackle a backlog of 16,000 complaints, including dozens from homeowners facing imminent foreclosures.”

www.nytimes.com/2025/03/15/b...

JD Vances housing line has been well known and he said it at the VP debate. He thinks the solution to the housing shortage is to deport millions and build sprawl on federal protected land. Anyone retweeting him is just a right winger MAGA dude hiding behind the seemingly nonpartisan YIMBY brand.

NEW: Biggest Federal Employee Unions Says Shutdown is Preferable to Elon/Trump CR talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/bigge...

Opinion | Trump, Perkins Coie and John Adams The President breaks a bedrock legal principle by targeting the law firm for representing clients he doesn’t like.

Trump's unprecedented retaliatory efforts against the Perkins Coie law firm have triggered the EVEN THE WALL STREET JOURNAL alarm, whose editorial page notes that Trump's actions "breaks a cornerstone principle of American justice going back to John Adams and the Founders."

Elon Musk wants me to justify my VA job? Here’s what I do to care for California veterans I work as a part-time doctor for the VA, treating the men and women who have served our country. The work I do can’t be distilled in bullet points.

My friend Dzovag’s beautiful piece about serving veterans as a doctor for the VA and why that can’t be summed up in bullet points. (Gift article )

Trans people have long warned that most of the victims of anti-trans laws and policies would be cis women and girls who don't have the "right look."

"Calvin Bentley still recalls how he felt when he finally moved his wife and 7-year-old son into a public housing development in Kansas City, Missouri: 'Liberated.'”

Family fears federal housing cuts could jeopardize their Missouri home The Department of Housing and Urban Development helped Calvin and Symone Bentley put a roof over their heads, but DOGE downsizing is making them nervous.

“Let’s just be real, if you really don’t have much housing, you probably don’t have much money to eat either,” Calvin Bentley said. “And if you were driving, you probably don’t have money for gas either.”
www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...

Cuts to Section 8 Housing Assistance Loom Amid HUD Uncertainty The Housing Choice Voucher program, a rent lifeline for low-income families, faces a funding shortfall as layoffs target the federal housing agency.

Los Angeles has now stopped accepting new applications for housing vouchers due to uncertainty in Washington — exactly what @patrickcsisson.bsky.social warned might happen www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

With the tariffs, I keep thinking about the high percentage of lumber that comes from Canada. Has anyone seen data or research about how this will affect housing prices?

CFPB drops lawsuit against JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Wells Fargo over Zelle fraud Since Acting Director Russell Vought has taken over the CFPB, the agency has dropped at least a half dozen cases brought by his predecessor, Rohit Chopra.

It's the Corporate Financial Protection Bureau now...

Rent is rising sharply in the most affordable areas, stressing low, middle-income tenants Rent jumped the past year in the least costly areas, straining low, middle-income residents. The rise defies a national slowdown in rent hikes

Everyday people are the backbone of our economy & they are hurting. The rent eats first – people’s budgets are consumed by high housing costs.

For working families, rent hikes can "cut into either medicine or food...or push them into homelessness,” said @shamusroller.bsky.social to @usatoday.com.