In August, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, in his working-man’s clothes—aviators, jeans, and a trucker hat—starred in a video where he carted people’s possessions out of a homeless encampment near a Los Angeles highway. On any given night in 2023, more than 650,000 people in the US experienced homelessness, with almost 400,000 unsheltered—though that figure may be an underestimate.