On May 14, 2026, HUD Secretary Scott Turner testified before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development on the administration's fiscal 2027 request, which would cut HUD's budget from $84.2 billion to $73.5 billion, roughly 13 percent. When senators pressed him on his results after more than a year in office, he repeatedly turned to the Biden administration's record.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), the subcommittee's ranking member, asked for the overdue homelessness Point-in-Time Count, which is usually released each December and which, as of mid-May, had not been published for 2025. “I just want to know, did you get the number down? Do we have 700,000 homeless still, or is it a million or 1.5 million?” she asked. “I just don't want to hear about what you don't like about the Biden administration. You're in charge. You have a vision. Let's see it. Let's see the results.” Turner replied that “the plays that were ran before I got here, they failed,” adding, “You said I have been here a little bit over a year, but you all had during the Biden administration four years.” Gillibrand cut in: “Stop talking about Biden. Talk about your record.”
Turner blamed the delayed report on the government shutdown and on “constant litigation,” then returned to Biden: “Irregardless of all of that, during the Biden administration, record funding.” “Oh, my God,” Gillibrand responded, saying it was “like two children saying 'I didn't do it, my brother did it.' Stop with the excuses. Just explain your record,” according to the transcript her office released.
Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) asked whether HUD could help more families with $84 billion or $73.5 billion. When Turner began, “Here's what I'll say. In the previous four years,” she cut him off: “This is the go-to answer for every secretary is to go back to Biden.” Murray also pressed Turner on the proposed elimination of the Continuum of Care homelessness program, which she said could put up to 170,000 people at risk of losing housing. Turner argued that “the housing-first model has failed.” UPI reported that Republican and Democratic appropriators in both chambers criticized the proposed cuts that week, with Republicans objecting to a $467 million cut to Native American housing programs.
Correction (October 2, 2026): an earlier version of this entry described the hearing as one before the full Senate Appropriations Committee; it was the Transportation-HUD subcommittee. It said Murray called the Biden deflection Turner's go-to answer “for every secretary” he had been on a panel with; she said going back to Biden is the go-to answer for every secretary. It said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen and other senators cited delayed reports and litigation as Turner's excuses; it was Turner who cited the shutdown and litigation, and no source places Shaheen in the exchange. It said the committee's frustration was bipartisan and that Turner offered no specific accomplishments; bipartisan criticism (per UPI) concerned the budget cuts, and the accomplishments claim was removed as a characterization.