A Trump administration official, Bill Pulte, has referred Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., to the Department of Justice over possible cases of mortgage and tax fraud, multiple outlets reported Thursday. This is the latest instance of the Trump administration using mortgage documents to attack its political opponents.
Key facts
Pulte, who leads the Federal Housing Finance Agency, sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi on Wednesday recommending that the Justice Department investigate Swalwell, according to NBC.
Criminal referrals to the DOJ do not necessarily mean the agency investigates or results in criminal charges.
The allegations against Swalwell center on alleged “false or misleading statements in loan documents” related to a property in Washington, D.C., and problems with declaring it as his primary residence.
Swalwell is now at least the fourth high-profile Democrat the Trump administration has investigated over his real estate holdings, joining New York Attorney General Letitia James, Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook and Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif. Former FBI Director James Comey, another Trump critic, was accused of lying to Congress.
So far, only James has been charged with a crime related to her mortgage documents, while investigations into Schiff and Cook remain pending.
The DOJ has not yet responded to a request for comment, and Swalwell, who describes himself as “Donald Trump’s most vocal critic in the last decade,” said in a statement that the only thing that surprised him about the criminal referral “is that it took him so long to come after me.”
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Chief Critic
“Like James Comey, John Bolton, Adam Schiff and Lisa Cook, Letitia James and the many more to come, I refuse to live in fear in what was once the freest country in the world,” Swalwell told NBC. “As Mark Twain said, ‘Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.’”
Why was Swalwell attacked?
Swalwell has been a vocal critic of Trump and both administrations, recently making statements against the president, such as calling for future Democratic presidents to destroy Trump’s planned White House ballroom and describing the government shutdown as an effort by Republicans to protect Trump from Epstein’s files. The Californian was also among the first Democrats to call for Trump to be investigated for his ties to Russia in the 2016 election, participated in Trump’s two impeachment trials during his first term, and is the lead plaintiff in an ongoing civil case seeking to hold Trump accountable for the January 6 assault on the Capitol. Swalwell had previously said he expected to be prosecuted by Trump’s DOJ, commenting in September: “I’m prepared for it. I expect it. But I’m not going to waver.”
What we don’t know
What will happen with the Swalwell case. It is unclear how long any investigation into the lawmaker could take or whether it could result in an indictment, which would have to be approved by a grand jury. The full scope of the allegations against Swalwell also remains uncertain, as does the degree to which they are supported by evidence. The Trump administration has been criticized for leveling mortgage fraud allegations against Democrats that experts say don’t hold up under scrutiny. The criminal charges against James for using his residence as a rental property have been widely criticized by legal experts, and it has also been suggested that Pulte has not provided sufficient information to conclude that Cook committed fraud, after the housing official alleged that he fraudulently listed two properties as his “primary residence.”
Tangent
Pulte has emerged as a key figure in the Trump administration’s efforts to punish Trump’s political opponents, as his investigations into alleged mortgage problems have formed the basis of most of the criminal charges that have been brought against the president’s enemies. Two watchdogs at government-backed mortgage company Fannie Mae were investigating whether Pulte legally obtained Democrats’ mortgage records, the Wall Street Journal reported, with the investigation eventually escalated to the U.S. attorney’s office in Virginia. However, it is unlikely that anything will come of that investigation, as those two officials were later removed from their positions. Pulte has previously said its investigations into Democrats’ mortgage documents are based on public records.
Surprising fact
Although the Trump administration has repeatedly taken action on how Democrats classify your “primary residence” on mortgage documents, such accusations are typically very rare. A Reuters analysis found that the federal government had only filed 20 indictments in the past eight years for a defendant who allegedly incorrectly stated his primary residence on a mortgage document. Almost all but one were part of a larger case focused on more serious charges, such as drug cultivation or bank fraud. The Trump administration’s use of alleged mortgage problems to attack Democrats has led to reports suggesting that top Trump officials have also had disagreements in their mortgage presentations, including Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. All have denied any wrongdoing. After Pulte accused Cook of declaring two properties as his primary residence, Reuters also reported that Pulte’s own father and stepmother had done the same in their mortgage documents, resulting in a Michigan town revoking the tax exemption on his property.
This article was originally published on Forbes US
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