The disAbility Law Center of Virginia is alarmed by the recent Executive Order titled “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets,” which calls for institutionalizing people against their will because they are unhoused, and attacking the civil rights of people living with mental illness.
In the 1999 Olmstead v. L.C. decision, the Supreme Court upheld that people with disabilities have the right to be free from unnecessary institutionalization. All of us have the right to due process before we can be detained against our will. This Executive Order calls on the Attorney General of the United States to reverse these hard-earned protections. It makes civil commitment of people living with mental illness, simply because they are unhoused, the explicit policy of the United States government.
Doubling down on the criminalization of homelessness and institutionalizing people living with mental illness will not “restore public order.” It will not solve our nation’s housing crisis. It will not eradicate addiction. But it will hurt people living with mental illness and the unhoused. We cannot return to practices of decades ago when people living with mental illness could be detained for little or no reason and held against their will in institutional settings with no recourse and no due process. The fight for the civil rights of people living with mental illness is incomplete and ongoing. We cannot lose ground now.
We call on the Administration uphold the rule of law, respect the dignity and civil rights of people living with mental illness, and support proven strategies for addressing homelessness, substance use, and mental illness, including the harm reduction strategies that have saved countless lives.