No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

Letitia James, Adam Schiff, Lisa Cook… all of these Trump enemies are being hit by the administration with charges (at least on social media) of mortgage fraud. This is not a coincidence. Josh Marshall explains how the process all starts with Bill Pulte, Trump’s Director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency. A MAGA Warrior Is Rifling Through Your Mortgage Paperwork. “The process goes like this. Pulte clearly has a Trump enemies list. Whether he gets directed explicitly by the White House or just knows on his own what’s wanted really doesn’t matter. He sifts through everyone’s mortgage records, finds something that he claims is evidence of fraud and immediately makes a referral to the DOJ. Now it’s a ‘federal investigation.’ From there he heads on to Twitter and announces that James or Cook or Schiff is guilty of mortgage fraud and under investigation. He goes beyond that and starts selectively releasing documents on Twitter or making claims about their guilt. We tend to think of the weaponization of federal government power as mostly centering on the Justice Department. But as you can see here, that’s hardly the case. It is a glaring example of the rules of the road under the second Trump administration. All the powers of the state are unleashed against the people who displease the president. Full stop.”

+ LA Times (Gift Article): A Trump donor, now a regulator, leads effort to accuse president’s foes of mortgage fraud.