If Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency is seeking additional targets in the fight against waste, fraud and abuse, he should look no further than to the federal government’s sprawling network of failed homeless programs, riddled with inefficiencies and pouring billions into a crisis that only gets worse.

Newly appointed HUD Secretary Scott Turner wasted no time identifying $260 million in savings at HUD, a crucial first step in streamlining an agency long plagued by inefficiencies. But this is just the tip of the iceberg.

DOGE has an opportunity to go much further, exposing the vast waste in the federal homelessness-industrial complex and redirecting billions toward policies that will actually deliver results.

For more than a decade, our nation has been locked into a single, federally mandated approach to homelessness known as "Housing First." This model, which promises “in perpetuity” housing with no requirements — for sobriety, for participation in treatment, or for seeking work — was championed by former President Barack Obama as the solution that would end homelessness within 10 years.

Instead, homelessness has exploded to record levels. Overdose deaths have surged, and public disorder has reached a breaking point.

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