In a tweet yesterday, President Trump threatened a vital piece of the 1968 Fair Housing Act (FHA). The 2015 Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) rule finally addressed and strengthened the FHA requirement that the government do something to end housing discrimination and segregation. The Trump Administration suspended AFFH in 2018, and this year proposed a rule that would significantly weaken it.
Jesse Van Tol, CEO of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition (www.ncrc.org), made the following statement:
“Americans are in the streets protesting police brutality and what it represents: systemic racism, profound inequality and the brutality of poverty that began with slavery. And now the president tweets a threat to end one of the most important pieces of civil rights legislation, and one of the few tools we have to rectify the horrors and massive injustices of past, legalized housing discrimination and segregation.
“AFFH is already crumbling under this administration. Trump’s threat is a dog whistle to people who want segregation and racial injustices to go on forever. Most Americans want to solve these problems.
“The 1968 Fair Housing Act was passed to eliminate housing discrimination and segregation.. NCRC is deeply opposed to the government’s plan to gut the Fair Housing Act’s AFFH rule and turn it into an affordable housing tool, rather than an anti-segregation mandate. I’m troubled by the president’s indifference to segregation, discrimination, inequality and to what the American people and our communities need to recover from the coronavirus catastrophe and to invest and build a more equitable and just economy for all.”
For more on AFFH and NCRC’s position, see:
HUD’s Proposed AFFH Rule Would Set Back Years Of Progress
2018 Press Statement on AFFH suspension
