Los Angeles Mayor Bass is worried that ICE raids will increase homelessness

(The Center Square) - While Californian officials boast about homelessness decreasing in the state, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said she thinks ICE raids could lead to an increase in people without homes.

New preliminary 2025 point-in-time reports showed that many local communities around California have experienced a decrease in homelessness. The Los Angeles area was one of them, making it the city’s second year in a row to have a decrease in homelessness.

Bass worries ICE raids in Los Angeles will reverse the progress the city has made to mitigate the homelessness crisis because deporting illegal immigrants means families will lose their income.

“I have talked to some of the people who lost their spouses, their spouses were detained, and they are not sure how they are going to make the rent,” Bass said during an interview July 30. “So we could have a whole new influx of homeless people because of policies like ICE.”

Bass said the reason why homelessness in the city of Los Angeles is going down is because she has taken a different approach to homelessness.

“Homelessness has gone down two years in a row because we chose to act with urgency and reject the broken status quo of leaving people on the streets until housing was built,” Bass said in a press release July 14. “These results aren’t just data points–they represent thousands of human beings who are now inside, and neighborhoods that are beginning to heal.”

In 2025, the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority counted around 72,308 homeless individuals in Los Angeles County and 43,699 homeless individuals in the City of Los Angeles.

In 2024, the LAHSA counted around 75,312 people in Los Angeles County and 45,252 people in the City of Los Angeles.

In 2023, the LAHSA counted around 75,518 people in Los Angeles County and 46,260 people in the City of Los Angeles.

Bass said when the Trump administration passed the order to deport illegal immigrants, it did not think about the consequences the policy would have.

“Politicians who pass policies don't think of the unintended consequences and some of those policies put people on the streets,” Bass said.

California experienced a 3% increase in homelessness last year compared to the year before, with 187,084 people living on the streets as of January 2024, according to the 2024 homelessness point-in-time count.

The count also showed an 18% increase in homelessness nationally.

California Gov. Newsom celebrated the report saying it showed “California had outperformed the nation,” and gave extensive credit to his “unprecedented policy and structural changes in state government” for helping the state’s homelessness crises.”

ICE officials could not immediately be reached for comment.