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In late February 2018, news stories reported that Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson spent $31,000 on a dining set for his office and billed it to the federal agency, just as the the Trump administration was planning to cut HUD's budget. Readers who saw these details discussed on social media asked if it was true -- and it is. The story has been vetted and reported by legitimate news sources. The New York Times reported on 27 February 2018: HUD spokesman Raffi Williams told the Times that at that time Carson had no intention of returning the dining set and didn't think the cost was too steep (even though many Americans earn less in a year than the price of the items). In May 2017, Carson was criticized for comments in which he expressed his opinion that low income people receiving housing assistance should not be made too comfortable. According to The Guardian, former top HUD official Helen Foster filed a complaint with a federal watchdog agency saying that she had been demoted and transferred in retaliation for resisting the expensive redecoration effort by Carson and his staff, even though it violated the law: By 1 March 2018, Carson responded to the controversy by notifying CNN that he had changed course and wanted to cancel the purchase: Revelations of the luxurious purchase came as Carson was advocating for budget cuts that would slash funding for the department, which provides housing assistance to vulnerable Americans like low-income elderly or disabled people:
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