Original subtitles

Last week tonight, I'm John Oliver. Thank you so much for joining us. Just

time for a quick recap of the week, which has been busy. The G20 met, COVID

shots for children were approved, and Facebook, in the midst of damaging

revelations from internal documents, made a big announcement.

I am proud to announce that starting today, our company is now meta.

Okay. I mean, that is stupid for several reasons. First, Netta is a terrible

name. It belongs in the Bad Name Hall of Fame alongside Ruth's Chris Steakhouse,

Noom, and Last Week Tonight.

But also, you can't just change your name to cover up the things that you're

ashamed of. Otherwise, years ago, the Pope would have responded to the

church's scandals by saying, good news, guys, we're no longer the Catholic

Church. Say hello to Halo.

I really think that should fix everything. Don't worry, we ship the old

name off to another parish.

But we're going to focus...

on Congress tonight, which spent this week focused on two things.

First, celebrating Halloween with Mitt Romney dressing up as Ted Lasso, quoting

Friday Night Lights for no clear reason, and even sharing biscuits with Kyrsten

Sinema in a move that felt very homeroom teachers dressed as the most popular

kids in school.

You think you're in on it, but you're very much not.

But the other major action concerned Biden's signature spending plan, which

appears to be taking its final shape.

The president outlining a $1.75 trillion plan.

to provide free universal pre-K for kids and extend the child tax credit for

families. It would also include money for child care and elder care and expand

Medicare to cover hearing.

And it would set aside more than a half trillion dollars to combat climate

change. Yeah, there is a lot in Build Back Better. Unfortunately, though, none

of it includes changing the name to something that doesn't sound like a

Gold's Gym promotional offer.

But while what is currently in there is great, it is hard not to be infuriated

by just how much has been cut out.

Paid family leave, free community college, and lower prescription drug

costs for seniors have all been dropped in negotiations. So some of Biden's

cornerstone promises have now gone, and basically, just like that.

Oh, shit.

God damn it.

Sorry, George.

I'm so sorry. I-I did it again. I'm sorry.

You couldn't have caught me at a worse time, John. I'm about to go trick-or

-treating. Ooh, actually sounds really fun. George, are you heading out with

your kids?

No.

Oh.

Okay. Uh, where was I? Oh, that's all right.

Paid family leave looks to be gone from Build Back Better, and Joe Manchin's

explanation for why he could not support it was pretty weak.

I want to work with everyone as long as we can start paying for things.

That's all. I can't put this burden on my grandchildren.

I've got ten grandchildren, and I'll be... I just can't do it.

What are you talking about?

We can't have paid family leave because of your grandkids?

You can't just use your offspring as an excuse for your bad decisions. You're

not Ted Cruz.

What? His daughters were cold. They wanted a vacation and they were cold.

And if cost was the issue here, it does not help that a proposed way to raise

revenue, a billionaire's tax, was also scrapped in the final negotiating push,

following complaints from, among others, Elon Musk, who tweeted, which is

actually a paraphrase of a famous Margaret Thatcher quote about socialism.

And I only hope that his next Thatcherism includes my personal

favorite of hers,

But it wasn't just Elon Musk. Here is Kyrsten Sinema's scene partner, Mitt

Romney, making his case against the tax.

Well, first of all, it's not a good idea to tell billionaires, don't come to

America, don't start your business here. But number two, you're going to tax

people not when they sell something, but just when they own it and the value goes

up. And what that means is that people are these multi-billionaires. They're

going to look and say, I don't want to invest in the stock market because as

that goes up, I'm going to get taxed. So maybe I will instead invest in a ranch

or in paintings or things that don't build jobs and create a stronger

economy. Okay, not to sound too much like Mitt's hero Ted Lasso, but Mitt

must be made of wood and yapping on the owl because that man is cuckoo like a

clock. Is he Dora the Explorer on an acid trip because he just can't stop

licking boots?

At the risk of stating the obvious here, billionaires already buy ranches and

paintings and dinosaur bones they have no use for. Why?

Because they have too much fucking money.

There literally aren't enough things on this planet for them to buy. That is why

they're all racing to space.

Whoever lands on Mars first gets it.

And it does seem many politicians would rather prioritize the hypothetical

threat to a billionaire's bank account above all else, because that's basically

how our world works now.

Politicians tweet about cosplaying... TV's nicest guy while opposing programs

that could fundamentally change people's lives. And the scariest trick this

Halloween might be that some people keep fucking falling for it. And now, this.

And now, once again, our annual look at what happens when local news and

Halloween collide.

Welcome to Living East Tennessee.

I'm Justin Young with Frank Murphy, and clearly we had different ideas when it

came to dressing up for Halloween.

Hey, what's up, man? How are you? You look lovely.

Oh, you look amazing. Thank you.

Look at this. Right over here.

Oh, my goodness. I'm just gonna lean, I think. We got a big wrestling tournament

downtown, which is a USA wrestling event. I got the chance to speak with

James Jude Courtney, who plays Michael Myers in the Halloween franchise.

Sweetest chef, can you tell us what... Our topic is today?

I can't handle this. And this rain activity is going to be headed up to New

York City later on tonight. 57 degrees is a high.

All right, well, I'm done with this.

Halloween's the best time for tricks, treats, child's play, and clowning

around. Even celebrities love Twisted Pennywise.

Take a look.

We have the clip.

Moving on. Our main story tonight concerns homelessness.

And I know that we are by no means the first show to cover this subject. Many

have tried, and perhaps not more memorably than the criminally canceled

Tyra Banks show.

I wanted to understand what their lives are really like and walk a day in their

shoes. No makeup, no lights. Nothing but me and the streets.

I stopped at two kids in the street playing ball.

I mean, there is so much going on there, but I want to focus on Franklin's face,

because that is the face of a kid who's definitely figured out the secret

identity of the woman who had a camera crew, looked like Tyra Banks, and

introduced herself saying, hi, my name is Tyra.

But despite Tyra's best efforts, homelessness is still a huge problem in

this country. For the fourth consecutive year, it increased nationwide, with the

most recent count suggesting there are over 580,000 people experiencing

homelessness in America. But the truth is, it is likely way more than that,

because that annual count only includes people that surveyors could find on the

streets or in shelters on a single night last year, a system that misses

countless people.

And not just that, experts project the pandemic recession could cause

chronic... to increase 49% over the next four years. And with this rise in

homelessness has come a corresponding rise in the rhetoric around it,

exemplified by segments like this.

We came out just to have some fun.

It's a great time.

Everybody's safe.

It's America. It's my home.

This used to be one of the crown jewels of Austin, but as you can see, another

tent city. The guy's walking around here with a machete, threatening people.

It started with box cutters as a weapon. Now we, sadly, we joke that we're the

machete capital of Texas.

Okay, hold on. I'm not saying that someone walking around with a machete

isn't scary, but you are making an outlier seem like the norm there, and

you've gone out of your way to make it scarier with visual effects.

And you can make anything frightening that way. Here, I'll show you.

Here is a bit of fun, just Shaquille O'Neal dancing with the Jabberwockies.

Oh, God, oh, no, now it's terrifying!

Leave him alone, Jabberwockies! Leave Shaq alone!

Run, Shaq, just run!

And look.

I know it is easy to criticize Fox News for being alarmist. Alarmism is their

whole thing. That and airing ads for pills that make your dick go bongo. But

the truth is, even some residents of Austin, famously a blue dot in a red

state, have said it's been a struggle to reconcile their feelings about their

homeless neighbors.

Do you think if you had seen this issue happening in another city and it wasn't

happening in your neighborhood, you would feel differently?

Once you're in the middle of it, you change your mind of how you approach the

situation. But as your safety declines, so does your compassion.

Every time I have to pick up human shit, my liberalness just got lowered one more

notch. Wow, that is very honest.

Every time I have to pick up human shit, my liberalism gets lowered is quite the

sentence. Although I'm surprised it was heard in this context and not in a

leaked recording from an Amy Klobuchar staff meeting.

And look, again...

I am not saying that that is a nice situation to be presented with, but far

too often, stories focusing on homelessness are presented solely

through the lens of how it affects those with homes, when in reality, it is

obviously the people without them who need the real help. And the demonization

of the homeless community in Austin may well have contributed to incidents like

this. We had so many people throw glass bottles from their

cars at our tents.

and said, y'all want trash.

Y'all need to get a job. Y'all need to get housing.

Y'all don't need to be out on the streets.

Or some would yell out, go home. It's like, this is technically our home.

Right. And that is obviously horrible, although I will say, no one screaming

out of a car window has ever said anything worthwhile.

It's like giving a eulogy through flash mob. The method of delivery alone is

just immediately disqualifying.

The story of homelessness in this country is grounded in a failure of

perception compounded by failures of policy. So tonight, let's look at the

way homelessness is talked about, how the problem is currently being made

worse, and what could actually help. And like so many things, the modern version

of this issue was turbocharged by Ronald Reagan, who came to power at a time when

homelessness was increasing and made the problem far worse by cutting programs

for the poor and slashing housing subsidies by 75%, making it pretty

galling. that Reagan regularly made arguments like this.

One problem that we've had, even in the best of times, and that is the people

who are sleeping on the grates. The homeless who are homeless, you might

say, by choice.

Uh, I'm sorry, homeless by choice?

Look, there were lots of things from 1984 that we could have used an undo

button for. Long Doc Dong, most of Temple of Doom, this extremely

unfortunate jello ad, but Reagan's quarter-arsed thoughts on homelessness

are near the top of that list. And that notion that homelessness isn't related

to economic policies, but simply reflects the problems of the individuals

experiencing it, still informs the way it's discussed today.

Here is Dr. Drew, of all people, to... talking to Seth Green of all people, and

pushing back on the notion that the homeless crisis in L.A. might have

anything to do with a shortage of affordable housing.

This isn't a housing problem. No.

No. That's a hoax. That's a hoax being perpetrated by the government here

locally. They need to stop.

Of course we have housing expense issues, but we just absorbed a million

illegal undocumented immigrants without a home, without a country, without a

job, without a penny.

We absorbed them. They found a place to live.

It's a hoax. So it's a mental health crisis, an addiction crisis.

Full-on.

Oh, okay, then. I certainly don't see why we wouldn't innately trust Dr.

Drew confidently mouth-splooging bullshit theories to Dr.

Evil's son, but...

A few notes on what he said there. Set aside the nonsense that undocumented

immigrants don't experience homelessness, because experts will tell

you that they very much do, they're just less likely to avail themselves of

services because of the whole undocumented thing. Instead, let's

address the notion that all of this is down to mental health and addiction.

Because yes, many who are homeless do struggle with both those things, and

those people are often the most visible. But... by no means all of them. Also, in

many cases, those struggles can be the result of being homeless and not the

cause of it. The truth is, there are many reasons someone might find

themselves without housing. Medical debt, job loss, fleeing domestic

violence, being kicked out of their homes because their parents don't

approve of their sexuality, or being recently released from prison, or just

the overriding fact that housing costs are rising much faster than wages.

Currently, 70% of all extremely low-income families are spending more

than half their income... on rent, and only 37 affordable and available homes

exist for every hundred extremely low-income renter households.

And that is a startlingly low number, especially considering just how much

this country loves watching TV shows about homes.

Little homes, humungo homes, homes for ghosts, and homes remodeled by weirdo

twins who definitely shower together, to name just a few of them.

The point here is, it doesn't take much for people to suddenly find themselves

without stable housing, as this woman found out.

Two years ago, Priscilla had a full-time job at a health clinic for the homeless.

Her husband, Ryan, stayed home to care for their two sons.

The youngest has severe autism.

They lived on a tight budget, and then their landlord raised the rent $150.

That's a lot of money for a lot of people that live paycheck by paycheck,

and we live like that.

The family was evicted, and in a place they never imagined.

Homeless themselves, living in their car.

I work at a homeless clinic, and I'm homeless.

How the heck does that happen to me?

Yeah, that is an awful situation to be in.

you never want to find yourself suddenly saying, how did this happen to me? With

the sole exception of being, if you are knee-deep in Stanley Tucci's sheets. And

even then, why question it? You're swimming in tooch, popper mint. This is

going to be a delight.

So despite Reagan's confidence, there can be not much choice in the matter

after all. As for those outward signs of homelessness that raise such alarm, they

are typically the result of public policy choices that we have made.

Remember that woman... about human shit, that is actually a common thread in

coverage of the homeless. In LA, you can find multiple stories about human feces

near homeless encampments. But it's worth knowing there is a reason for

that. Most of the city's hundreds of encampments are nowhere near a public

toilet. In fact, LA has only 16 mobile toilet stations for its 36,000

homeless people. To make matters worse, with no funding for round-the-clock

security, the city hauls away these toilets at night, leaving the homeless

no choice but to go on the streets.

What the fuck to all of that? From the amount of public toilet stations

available being less than the amount of Bond movies, to shuffling those very

minimal toilets away like they're gonna turn into a pumpkin at midnight.

And while that clip is from just before the pandemic, which prompted city

officials to increase toilet stations, there are still currently only 55

accessible 24-7. So, the next time you complain about human shit in the street,

maybe think about what it would be like if someone padlocked your bathroom every

night.

you too will suddenly be getting really creative really fast.

And it seems the impulse behind many local policies surrounding unhoused

people isn't so much to help them as to punish them for their existence and keep

them out of sight.

You're probably familiar with hostile architecture designed to prevent

homeless people from sitting and lying on certain property. It's why you'll

sometimes see spikes under bridges like this or benches with dividers to prevent

anyone lying down.

And one city went even beyond architecture.

Debate raging over a Florida city playing children's music at a park

pavilion at night to keep homeless people away. People say the music

rotates between Baby Shark and this song. Jeez, jeez. It's raining tacos.

Raining tacos.

It's true.

They pumped the song Raining Tacos at people when they were just trying to

sleep, which is completely inhumane. Nobody deserves that. Also, and I know

this isn't the key point, that song doesn't deserve it either, because it is

a certified banger. Take a listen.

It's raining tacos Out in the street Tacos All you

can eat Lettuce and shells Cheese and meat

Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. I would love to play you more, but the problem

is this show would then get too fun and I'd spend the rest of the show dancing

in the aisles with you and Ellen would literally kill me.

But it is not just spikes and songs.

More and more city ordinances have been put into place criminalizing behaviors

associated with being homeless. Over the course of 13 years, citywide bans on

camping have increased by 92%, on sitting or lying by 78%, on loitering

and panhandling by 103%, and on living in vehicles by 213%. So when you hear

fearmongering about rising crime among the homeless, it's worth asking yourself

if those crimes were actually crimes or just someone sat down.

Take... Kenneth Schultz, a 71-year-old homeless man who told reporters,

sometimes I just get exhausted and boom, sit down, that's it, you're trespassing.

In the nine years he's been homeless, he's been charged with trespassing 96

times and has spent one of every three nights in jail.

And think about what that means.

It means he's spent three of the last nine years behind bars. In what way is

that man being helped?

You cannot arrest someone out of homelessness in the same way that you

can't sing someone out... out of bankruptcy.

One thing doesn't remotely lead to the other, and you're just gonna end up

making things worse, even if you're singing this.

It's raining tacos.

It's raining tacos.

No, no, turn it off. I am warning you, Ellen is sharpening her knives as we

speak. She'll do it. It won't be the first time.

And criminalizing homelessness exposes already vulnerable populations to

unnecessary interactions with the police.

Unhoused people of color are more likely to be cited, searched, and have property

taken than white people experiencing homelessness.

And those with multiple marginalized identities, like LGBTQ plus people of

color, are even more vulnerable to these laws.

And if you're thinking, well, hold on.

Why don't homeless people just go to shelters?

There can be a lot of problems with that. Some cities simply don't have

enough beds for everyone. In Oakland, for example, in 2019, there were 457

beds available for more than 4,000 unhoused people, meaning they couldn't

provide everyone with a bed, even if they Willy Wonka'd the situation.

And if I may, I'd actually like to pause at this point for just a quick tangent,

so put 40 seconds on the clock, please.

Regarding this, I don't mind Charlie's grandparents.

sleeping in one bed. Everyone always asks, but what about when they have to

fuck? Do they fuck separately or all do it together? To which I say, I don't

care, and I hope so. They're not related by blood. They're related by their

children's marriage.

It's not their fault they have to share one rickety bed.

Grandpa George is going to want to make love to Grandma Georgina. They've shared

a life together. And Grandpa Joe is obviously going to want to get it in

Grandma Josephine. That's the mother of his children. But at a certain point, if

you don't invite the couple sleeping in the same bed to join in, it is just...

So the next time you talk shit about Charlie Bucket's elder sexual

proclivities, ask yourself this. Are they the problem, or were you just

raised in a puritanical society that shames any sexual deviation from the

quote-unquote norm?

Oh, that's my time.

That's my time.

I've said my piece.

Back to the sad stuff.

The point is, some cities don't have enough shelter beds, and even in those

that have many, like here in New York, they are not always an option for

everyone. Some might not want to split up their family, or part with their

pets, or are simply wary of bringing their only possessions around a room

full of strangers.

But also, the key problem with saying, why don't people just go to shelters, is

that shelters are only a stopgap solution, because you don't live in a

shelter, you just sleep in one, as this woman points out.

It's very, very rough.

I would rather stay on the streets.

And this is why I understand when I see a lot of homeless people, why they're on

the streets.

Shelter degrades you. I work part-time.

I went from a full-time job to a part-time job being in the shelter.

Because there's just too much going on. I have to be in at 8 o'clock every

night. If I'm not in at 8 o'clock, I lose that bet. You wake up at 5 o'clock,

you have to be out of there at 7 o'clock.

Regardless.

Yeah. an 8 p.m. curfew, and a 7 a.m. kick out the door. So if pulling

yourself up by your bootstraps involves working nights, I'm sorry, you're shit

out of luck.

And if you're thinking, no, John, surely a shelter eventually helps people get

back on their feet. Everything worthwhile in life takes time. I read

that on a pillow once.

Well, think again, because just look what happened when the person who filmed

that woman caught up with her almost eight years later.

You talked about going in and out of the shelter system.

And that's still happening. And that's still happening.

They place you.

They let you go.

They move you. They let you go.

They get your money from the government. They let you go. And you're still

misplaced. Yeah.

the shelter system has done nothing to change her circumstance.

And I will be the first to admit here, it's impossible for me to understand

just how hard that cycle is. I've been lucky enough to have always lived in an

apartment, or a house, or most recently, an infinite white void run by an abusive

landlord. That was hard in its own way, but it was nothing compared to a

potentially life or death game of musical beds.

So, if all we've mentioned so far tonight, poking homeless people with

spikes, blasting them with music and locking them up doesn't solve this

problem. What does?

Well, this housing advocate has a bold new idea.

The solution is simple. This is what the solution is. It's the only thing that is

homelessness, is this right here, house keys.

Exactly. House keys. In other words, give the homeless...

Holmes is the solution you've probably been shouting at your TV for the past 15

minutes, or, let's be honest, shouting at your laptop, or, if we're being

really honest, shouting at your phone during your Monday morning shit.

And if you are annoyed that I wasted your time taking the scenic route here,

let me make it up to you with another excellent clip from the Tyra Banks show.

There is...

some context for that, but the truth is, it honestly wouldn't make it make much

more sense.

Now, some will say, sure, Giving the homeless homes is an obvious solution,

but before that, they need to be sober and have a job. But it's just not that

simple. Set aside that dealing with sobriety or your mental health issues is

hard enough when you are not living on the streets.

Getting a job is often, if not contingent on, at least aided by, having

an address.

That is why advocates endorse an approach called Housing First.

It prioritizes helping people get a place to live, but also offers support

like mental health and addiction.

We've actually tried a version of this with homeless veterans before, and it

had some real success.

The first step of this new model is a permanent house, funded mostly at

government expense, with services then added around the resident.

It's called permanent supportive housing, and that's what Lendl C. found

himself in.

See lives in this complex that houses only formerly homeless veterans.

While there is no firm program that he has to follow, he has access to support

services, including on-site case managers, mental health counseling,

substance abuse treatment, and even a community garden. It feel good.

Sometimes I walk around the apartment, no TV or nothing on, and just singing

for no reason at all. And then I catch myself doing it, and I start laughing.

I say, you must be going crazy now.

But I'm just happy. A good crazy. It feels good.

That is a very nice thing to see. It's like...

two babies hugging or four grandparents absolutely railing each other. It's

something that just fills you with hope.

And thanks to this Housing First strategy, the number of homeless

veterans dropped from 74,000 in 2010 to 38,000 in 2018, a near 50%

reduction. And supportive housing is just one version of what this can look

like. For those recently made homeless, rapid rehousing provides short-term

rental assistance and services to help people get back on their feet quickly.

And look...

Housing First programs clearly require significant resources and funding, but

it is not like our current approach is cheap.

One study in Florida that tracked a decade's worth of spending on just 107

chronically homeless people found that just between money spent on

incarceration and emergency medical treatment, their communities and local

governments had spent an average of just over $31,000 per person per year, when

the estimated cost of providing with permanent supportive housing would have

only been around $10,000. So, if your argument against housing for the

homeless was purely monetary, congratulations, your concerns have been

answered. Also, a pre-congratulation for being visited by three ghosts this

upcoming Christmas Eve.

But funding is not the only issue here. A huge obstacle in implementing these

sorts of programs is opposition from local residents. It is the NIMBY

problem. Not in my backyard.

And it happens absolutely everywhere.

Take Claremont, California, where new developments offering affordable

housing, including those geared to the homeless, were proposed, only to

encounter fierce community pushback like this.

You don't need to put it in our backyard.

It's not fair.

What they're doing is past crazy.

Well, it's just going to go downhill. If you bring all that in, all their

riffraff, I don't need it.

It's just not the right place.

I agree that they need help. I agree that they need to find a location.

But Claremont's not the location to be had. How is that going to impact crime?

How is that going to impact the businesses out here? If they're low

income, are they going to be spending money at the sushi place or, you know,

or not?

Oh, no, not the sushi place.

I didn't realize a prerequisite for housing was a willingness to spend

Friday nights deep-throating nigiri.

As for that guy saying, I agree they need to find a location, just not here,

where then?

Because you do get just because someone leaves your site doesn't mean they stop

existing, right? It's a concept that we all learned pretty early on after about

eight months of absolutely terrifying games of peek-a-boo.

And Claremont is by no means an isolated example.

In North Texas, local residents mobilized against a proposed affordable

housing project, which had units set aside for residents using housing choice

or Section 8 vouchers. Basically, rental subsidies for low-income or homeless

individuals. And here is how one opponent of the project explained

herself.

The lifestyle I feel like that goes with Section 8 is usually working single moms

or people who are struggling to keep their heads above water. And it's not, I

feel so bad saying that, but it's not, it's just not people who are, I guess,

are the same.

classes us, which sounds bad, but I don't mean that in a bad way. Do you

think that you maybe are stereotyping the folks? Oh, I totally am, 100%. It's

not. It works both ways.

I'm definitely not a racist and I'm not bigot, but I think I hold a little bit

of a stigma against people who are different.

Okay, so...

Quick corrections there.

You don't feel that bad saying it. The things you're saying are things racists

and bigots say.

And saying, I'm not a racist or a bigot, but also saying you have a stigma

against people who are different isn't necessarily splitting hairs, but it's

definitely segregating them.

While that woman lives in a conservative area of Texas, plenty of the places

you've seen tonight and plenty of the places where these sentiments run

deepest are deep blue liberal cities.

The truth is, some of you watching this right now may share... to share some of

those views. And if you do, I implore you to take in every word of this

formerly unhoused mother, Kiana K. Scott, who wrote a letter to the NIMBYs

in her hometown.

You wear your bias like a badge of honor when you see my history. You judge me

for having children, for needing assistance.

You hate me for wanting the stability you take for granted. And why?

Because you didn't like looking the other way when you saw me on the street?

Or is it simply because I make you uncomfortable and your discomfort is

enough to disqualify a person from the American dream?

Exactly. She's absolutely right. It is not the housed comfort that needs to be

prioritized right now.

So if you're wondering why homelessness continues to get worse in this country,

one reason is that there are a lot of people, even liberals, who believe that

homelessness is a personal failing, poverty can be avoided, and their own

good fortune makes them not only better than the unhoused, but more worthy of

comfort. It is basically Reagan's attitude from a Whole Foods crowd.

And I do not want to oversimplify the logistics involved here. It will take a

massive commitment in infrastructure, funding, and resources.

But the very first step here is a... a collective change of perceptions.

Basically, we need to stop being dicks and assuming that the unhoused are a

collection of drug addict criminals who've chosen this life for themselves

instead of people suffering the inevitable consequences of gutted social

programs and a nationwide divestment from affordable housing. I really hope

that is one of the two key things that sticks in your head from tonight's show.

The other, of course, being this.

That's our show. Thank you so much for watching. We'll see you next week