US supreme court rules unhoused people sleeping outside can be fined and jailed

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Conservative bloc

• Alito – Majority

• Barrett – Majority

• Gorsuch – Majority

• Kavanaugh – Majority

• Roberts – Majority

• Thomas – Majority

Liberal bloc

• Jackson – Minority

• Kagan – Minority

• Sotomayor – Minority

The US supreme court has ruled that cities in the US west can criminalize unhoused people sleeping outside even when they lack access to shelter.

The ruling is a victory for Grants Pass, Oregon, which in 2019 passed ordinances prohibiting sleeping and camping in its public parks and on its streets, banning unhoused people from “using a blanket, pillow, or cardboard box for protection from the elements”. The city’s policies call for $295 fines and criminal prosecution punishable by up to 30 days in jail after multiple offenses.

The court ruled 6-3 that it is not “cruel and unusual punishment” under the eighth amendment to ban unhoused people from camping outside when they have nowhere else to go. The decision stands to broadly affect how American cities approach homelessness and could lead to more jurisdictions passing laws to ticket, fine and jail people for living outside, marking a significant erosion of unhoused people’s rights.

Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote: “Homelessness is complex. Its causes are many. So may be the public policy responses required to address it … A handful of federal judges cannot begin to ‘match’ the collective wisdom the American people possess in deciding ‘how best to handle’ a pressing social question like homelessness.”

In a blistering dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote: “Sleep is a biological necessity, not a crime. For some people, sleeping outside is their only option. The City of Grants Pass jails and fines those people for sleeping anywhere in public at any time, including in their cars, if they use as little as a blanket to keep warm or a rolled-up shirt as a pillow. For people with no access to shelter, that punishes them for being homeless. That is unconscionable and unconstitutional. Punishing people for their status is ‘cruel and unusual’.”

The case originated with a challenge by Debra Blake, a woman convicted of illegal camping in the small Oregon mountain town, where rents are rising and there is only one overnight shelter for adults. Blake became the lead plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit that ultimately was decided in her favor by the ninth circuit of appeals in 2022.

The appeals court ruled that Grants Pass could not enforce its camping ban if it didn’t provide shelter, saying that criminalizing sleeping outside when shelter is unavailable was an eighth amendment violation. The decision applied to the western states of Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington. The Oregon town appealed to the supreme court, and Friday’s ruling reverses that decision.

Cities and governments across the US have argued that they should have greater latitude to prohibit and punish sleeping outside as homelessness surges, while advocates for the unhoused argue that criminalization is unconstitutional and only further exacerbates the humanitarian crisis.

Lawyers for the unhoused residents of Grants Pass said the city’s policies had, in effect, banished unhoused people from existing within the jurisdiction.

Advocates fear the ruling will see an increase in similar local policies that make it unlawful to be unhoused, leading the poorest residents to be shuffled from one town to the next without getting shelter or services they need to exit homelessness. Civil rights groups have long argued that bans and punishments worsen people’s crises on the streets, making it significantly harder to access medical care, jobs and social service programs.

The National Homelessness Law Center called the decision “profoundly disappointing” in a statement: “Arresting or fining people for trying to survive is expensive, counterproductive and cruel. This inhumane ruling … will make homelessness worse in Grants Pass and nationwide. Cities are now even more empowered to neglect proven housing-based solutions and to arrest or fine those with no choice but to sleep outdoors.”

The national 2023 homeless count, a rough estimate from a single day last year, found there were more than 653,000 people experiencing homelessness across the US, a 12% increase from 2022. The figures are considered undercount. The emergency is particularly acute in the west, where many of those without housing were counted living outside in makeshift shelters and cars, instead of in indoor shelter programs.

California counted more than 123,400 people living outside, accounting for nearly half of all unsheltered people in the US. California, Oregon, Hawaii, Arizona and Nevada had the highest rates of their homeless populations living outdoors.