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Marcia Fudge took over as Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), with high expectations. As she put it in 2021, "Together, we will tackle the country’s housing and homelessness crises." 

More than two years later, Fudge has produced nothing but failure. Last year, the number of homeless people in the United States set a record at more than 421,000 individuals, as did the number of chronically homeless people (almost 128,000) — an 11% increase overall. This year, more than 100 cities and states have experienced higher homelessness rates, many of them Democrat-run urban areas like Boston and Chicago. 

Across 20 major U.S. cities tracked by Bloomberg, the number of people in families experiencing homelessness has jumped nearly 38%. In Democrat-run New York City, homelessness has skyrocketed by two-thirds in 2023. 

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Where is Fudge now? Apparently, she’s too busy playing the race card and blaming "systemic racism" for the struggles of Black people. In her words: "My home is valued less than the White neighborhood down the block." 

HUD Secretary Marcia Fudge has been a disaster. FILE: Fudge speaks at WH Press Conference March 18, 2021.

HUD Secretary Marcia Fudge has been a disaster. FILE: Fudge speaks at WH Press Conference March 18, 2021.

Fudge is doubling down on the Democratic Party’s usual refrain when all else fails: Victimhood politics. Positioning Blacks as victims who need saving by the Biden administration, Democrats like Fudge say the quiet part out loud: "We have rooted our work in the principle of racial equity." 

Emphasis on equity, and not equality. Rather than supporting the equality of opportunity for Blacks, Whites and all Americans, Fudge is solely concerned with an equality of outcome, filling arbitrary quotas based on skin color. That, and complaining about nebulous "discrimination" without providing concrete examples. 

Black people deserve better than to be coddled as victims. Blacks deserve better than today’s Democrats. Treat yourself like a victim, and you’re only victimizing yourself. 

Blacks who still buy the Democrat bag of tainted goods, after decades of failed Democrat policies in their communities, only have themselves to blame for the failure. People like Fudge are nothing more than racial demagogues who prey on anger and frustration, blaming the White boogeyman to consolidate the power with which they do nothing but undermine the Black community. 

What Fudge and other Democrats won’t discuss publicly is America’s No. 1 social problem: The epidemic of fatherlessness. They say nothing about the nearly 70 percent of Black kids who enter the world without a father in the home married to the mother — up from 24 percent back in 1965. 

They ignore the numbers, even though the numbers can’t lie: A child raised without a father is five times more likely to be poor and commit crime, nine times more likely to drop out of school, and 20 times more likely to end up in jail. Even Barack Obama acknowledged that before he was president, and before he too got swept up by Al Sharpton and the rest of America’s race-hustling crowd. 

If Fudge genuinely cared about Black people, she wouldn’t be such a staunch advocate for abortion, which has killed tens of millions of Black babies. Fudge wouldn’t support organizations like Planned Parenthood and its eugenic roots, designed to limit the Black population from the outset. 

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Dating back to the War on Poverty, Democrat policies are killing the Black family. The welfare state has incentivized women to marry the government and incentivized men to abandon their financial and moral responsibilities.  

Black people deserve better than to be coddled as victims. Blacks deserve better than today’s Democrats. Treat yourself like a victim, and you’re only victimizing yourself. 

Separating work from income, never-ending government handouts are forcing Black kids to grow up without role models, exacerbating the crime problem, and making the Black community more dangerous than ever before. 

Memo to Fudge’s HUD: You can’t tackle housing and homelessness without bringing back the concept of "home" first — a household with two parents who set kids up for success. Rebuild the traditional family, and Black children will finally have a chance.  

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With parents who can instill the values of hard work and individual responsibility, as my parents did for my brothers and me, Black kids will be better-equipped to live the American Dream. 

Until then, don’t expect the housing or homelessness crises to get fixed. Without a solution to fatherlessness, Black people have no answers for anything else. 

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM LARRY ELDER