The Trump administration is launching a new plan to initiate legal guardianship proceedings for hundreds of the “most vulnerable” veterans in the country.
The administration announced the move on Wednesday, saying that the Department of Justice and Department of Veterans Affairs agreed to a plan that would see VA attorneys appointed as special assistant U.S. attorneys, allowing them to start and participate in state court conservatorship and guardianship proceedings, according to joint releases from the department.
According to the announcement, the initiative is aimed at hundreds of veterans in VA care “who are unable to make their own health care decisions and have no family or legal representation to help them.” The release notes that veterans “who are either homeless or at risk of homelessness” are among that targeting population, although a VA spokesperson stressed the effort is not specifically aimed at veterans experiencing homelessness. Guardians are appointed if a court finds an individual can’t make decisions on their basic needs or safety. The appointed guardian can control one’s finances and living situation, including compelling them to get medical treatment if they deem it necessary.
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They are often initiated by family members, and are hard to terminate. Civil liberties advocates and groups have said that such programs can take away one’s legal rights. The VA and Department of Justice said that such guardianships or conservatorships can help veterans “avoid unwarranted continued hospitalization, protect their rights, and promote appropriate transitions of care from VA hospitalization to other forms of VA care or care in the community.”
VA spokesperson Peter Kasperowicz said that the initiative is aimed at approximately 700 veterans currently in VA hospitals nationwide who are “unable to make their own health care decisions.” He again stressed that the program is not specifically about homeless veterans and is not the VA’s policy towards those experiencing homelessness.
Despite that, groups advocating for veterans and unhoused Americans have expressed concern over what it could mean for homeless vets. Legal guardianship can help veterans get treatment and care, the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans said in a statement, but added that they must “be used sparingly, with strong safeguards, and always with the best interests and rights of the veteran at the center of the process” due to the seriousness of the step.
“Policies that expand legal authority over a veteran’s decision making risk undermining trust between veterans and the systems designed to support them if they are not implemented with extreme care and transparency,” the statement continued.
The National Homeless Law Center, a nonprofit legal group, described the policy as a plan to “strip homeless veterans of their rights and autonomy.” Jesse Rabinowitz, the center’s communications director told Task & Purpose that there is strong bipartisan support for ending veteran homelessness and helping struggling veterans, but this move does address root causes to issues such as homelessness.
Kasperowicz also noted that potential guardians would not be VA employees and the process for deciding if guardianship is needed would have “full due-process and process rights” with “continuous court supervision of the guardian.”
According to federal data, 33,000 veterans are unhoused, out of more than 770,000 Americans who experience homelessness according to the 2024 point-in-time homelessness count. That was an 8% drop from 2023, however approximately 14,000 are unsheltered. In a July 2025 executive order regarding “crime and disorder on America’s streets,” President Donald Trump encouraged the expansion of civil commitment and institutional treatment. The same order claimed that the “overwhelming majority of these individuals are addicted to drugs, have a mental health condition, or both.” Research into homelessness notes that although unhoused Americans are more likely to have serious mental illness or substance use disorders, data from the Department of Housing and Urban Development put the number of people dealing with addiction or mental health issues as far less than half of the unhoused population.
Other groups expressed concern of the general impact of what the new policy would mean for veterans’ agency. The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a nonprofit advocacy group, said that it strongly opposes the agreement, saying that guardianship can “be extremely difficult to reverse.” The group instead called for prioritizing policy initiatives including expanding healthcare access and funding mental health status, to “help veterans maintain stability and independence.”
