A federal appeals court on Monday granted San Francisco greater freedom to sweep homeless encampments. The decision comes after last month’s Supreme Court ruling expanded cities’ power to police homelessness.
In December 2022, U.S. Magistrate Judge Donna Ryu ordered an injunction barring San Francisco from enforcing laws against public camping without first offering a shelter bed — part of the ongoing lawsuit against the city over its homelessness policies.
The injunction relied on Ninth Circuit rulings that found punishing unhoused people for sleeping on public property when shelter beds aren’t available violates the Constitution’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. The Supreme Court overturned those rulings, and the Ninth Circuit has now ordered Ryu to vacate the portion of her injunction that leaned on them.