NY AG James Facing Criminal Probe In Mortgage Fraud Case: Report
New York Attorney General has made a career out of going after President Donald Trump and proclaiming that “no one is above the law,” but now things have changed.
The Justice Department, led by U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, has opened a criminal investigation into the Empire State’s top lawmaker, Fox News reported.
Separately, a grand jury in the Eastern District of Virginia has started to send subpoenas in a case related to accusations that James committed mortgage fraud when she misrepresented a single-family home in Virginia as her primary residence to get better terms on her loan.
The news came after a criminal referral from the Trump administration’s Federal Housing Finance Agency Director William Pulte, who asked the DOJ to investigate James over that accusation and another case where she has been accused of misrepresenting the number of livable units in a Brooklyn apartment building to get better terms on her loan.
“These baseless and long-discredited allegations, put to rest by my April 24 letter to the Department of Justice, are suddenly back in the news just days after President Trump publicly attacked Attorney General James,” Abbe Lowell, an attorney for the New York attorney general, said Thursday.
“This appears to be the political retribution President Trump threatened to exact that AG Bondi assured the Senate would not occur on her watch. If prosecutors are genuinely interested in the truth, we are prepared to meet false claims with facts,” he said.
Pulte informed James of the referral in a letter sent to her and U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche.
In the letter, he alleged that James had “falsified records” to get a mortgage for a Virginia property in 2023 that she said was her primary residence while she was employed as a New York state prosecutor.
Ironically, in her case against President Trump, James accused him of falsifying records.
“Ms. James was the sitting Attorney General of New York and is required by law to have her primary residence in the state of New York — even though her mortgage applications list her intent to have the Norfolk, VA, property as her primary home,” the letter said.
“It appears Ms. James’ property and mortgage-related misrepresentations may have continued to her recent 2023 Norfolk, VA property purchase in order to secure a lower interest rate and more favorable loan terms,” it said.
Pulte alleged that James purchased a five-family home in Brooklyn in February 2001 but has “consistently misrepresented the same property as only having four units in both building permit applications and numerous mortgage documents and applications.”
He included documents that showed she also purchased another home with her father as a co-signer where they claimed to be “husband and wife” in 1983 and 2000.
“While this was a long time ago, it raises serious concerns about the validity of Ms. James’ representations on mortgage applications,” he said.
In another bit of irony, James insinuated the Trump administration is engaged in a political witch hunt against her.
“Attorney General James is focused every single day on protecting New Yorkers, especially as this Administration weaponizes the federal government against the rule of law and the Constitution. She will not be intimidated by bullies — no matter who they are,” a spokesman for her office said.
In his letter to Attorney General Bondi, Lowell also insinuated that the Trump administration was going after his client for political reasons.
“The stunning hypocrisy of President Trump’s complaint that the Justice Department had been ‘politicized’ and ‘weaponized’ against him is laid bare as he and others in his administration are now asking you to undertake the very same practice,” he said in his letter to Bondi.
