Late Monday, Marcia Fudge, the 18th Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), announced her resignation, effective March 22. She has led the department for three years and is the second Black woman to ever head the agency. She plans to retire and return to Ohio.
“It’s time to go home,’’ Fudge told USA Today in an exclusive interview. “I do believe strongly that I have done just about everything I could do at HUD for this administration as we go into this crazy, silly season of an election.”
Adrianne Todman, the deputy housing secretary, will take over the department as acting secretary. Given the impending national election, it seems unlikely that a new secretary will be vetted and confirmed by the Senate before November.
“It has always been my belief that government can and should work for the people,” Fudge said in her official statement. “For the last three years, I have fully embraced HUD’s mission to create strong, sustainable, inclusive communities and quality affordable homes for all. The people HUD serves are those who are often left out and left behind. These are my people. They serve as my motivation for everything we have been able to accomplish.”
Among the accomplishments under her leadership, Fudge noted that HUD has funded more than 2 million units of public housing and multifamily housing; spent more than 20 percent of HUD’s procurement dollars with Black, Brown, and other small, disadvantaged businesses in the last year alone, totaling $500 million; and served or permanently housed more than 1.2 million people experiencing homelessness in the U.S.
“When I took office, we inherited a broken housing system, with fair housing and civil rights protections badly dismantled under the prior administration,” President Joe Biden said in his own statement. “On Day One, Marcia got to work rebuilding the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and over the past three years she has been a strong voice for expanding efforts to build generational wealth through homeownership and lowering costs and promoting fairness for America’s renters.”