In August 2025, a rumor spread that U.S. President Donald Trump had capped housing rental assistance to two years. The move referred to Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher programs, which can cover all or part of the rent for low-income households based on income information and the number of people in a family sharing the home for eligible housing.
According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan think tank, 10 million people across 5 million households in the U.S. benefited from this program, run by the Department of Housing and Urban Development and administered by state and local authorities. The Furman Center at New York University confirmed this number in a July 17, 2025, article.
For example, a post on X (archived) claimed that the new cap would be implemented as soon as fall 2025:
The post had 2.5 million views and 37,000 likes as of this writing. A similar post appeared on Facebook. Further, Snopes readers searched the site and emailed to inquire about the veracity of the claim.
The cap was part of a 46-page discretionary budget proposal the Trump administration put forth on May 2, 2025. However, nothing indicated it was set to be implemented as of this writing. For this reason, Snopes deemed the claim false.
Typically, a discretionary budget is funded through appropriations in Congress
The budget proposal included an item addressing rental assistance programs on Page 25 (emphasis ours):
The Budget empowers States by transforming the current Federal dysfunctional rental assistance programs into a State-based formula grant which would allow States to design their own rental assistance programs based on their unique needs and preferences. The Budget would also newly institute a two-year cap on rental assistance for able bodied adults, and would ensure a majority of rental assistance funding through States would go to the elderly and disabled. A State-based formula program would also lead to significant terminations of Federal regulations. In combination with efforts related to opening up Federal lands, this model would incentivize States and the private sector to provide affordable housing. This proposal would encourage States to provide funding to share in the responsibility to ensure that similar levels of recipients can benefit from the block grant.
The Budget includes $25 million in housing grants for youth aging out of foster care.
On Page 26, the proposal said the two-year cap would also apply to people with AIDS:
The Budget consolidates the Continuum of Care and Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDS programs into a more targeted Emergency Solutions Grant (ESG) program that provides short- and medium-term housing assistance, capped at two years, to homeless and at-risk individuals.
In other words, a two-year cap on housing rental assistance was part of the Trump administration's plans. However, as of this writing, the changes had not been implemented.
The website of the Congressional Budget Office indicated that the appropriations process for the full-year 2026 discretionary budget had not yet been completed, as of this writing. The Budget hearing for HUD appropriations took place on June 10, 2025. During the hearing, HUD Secretary Scott Turner suggested the measure would help fix waste and fraud. "HUD assistance is not supposed to be permanent. It should be a trampoline, not a hammock and not a resting place," he said.
On July 17, 2025, this specific proposal passed the appropriations committee, which a
Also on July 17, the Housing Solutions Lab at the NYU Furman Center found in a study that almost half the people receiving housing assistance would be "subject to the new requirements."