As the Trump administration weighs mortgage fraud charges against Democrats, Trump’s critics accused the administration of enforcing a double standard.
Trump has frequently described his desire for revenge on past antagonists. On Oct. 9, federal prosecutors in Virginia secured a grand jury indictment against New York Attorney General Letitia James on charges related to mortgage fraud. James prosecuted Donald Trump in a civil case in New York between his two presidential terms. She has maintained her innocence.
Dan Koh, a onetime aide to former President Joe Biden who now hosts “The People’s Cabinet” podcast, criticized Trump and his administration during an Oct. 9 appearance on CNN’s “Newsnight with Abby Phillip,” hours after James’ indictment became public. (On Oct. 16, Koh announced he was running for the U.S. House in Massachusetts’ 6th district.)
During the show’s roundtable, Koh said prosecutors are “accusing Letitia James of this mortgage fraud. There are three Cabinet members who committed mortgage fraud that he’s just letting fly.”
Koh told PolitiFact he was referencing a Sept. 4 article by the investigative news organization ProPublica. The article said three Cabinet members — Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin — had each declared more than one home as their principal residence.
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We found no news reports or statements from government officials about any of the three Cabinet members being targeted for prosecution for mortgage-related actions.
Legal experts have criticized James’ prosecution as questionable, given that scenarios like hers — involving modest amounts of money and given the difficulty of proving intent to defraud — are rarely prosecuted.
However, Koh overstepped when he said the three Cabinet members had “committed mortgage fraud.”
The original documents ProPublica published show the mortgage agreements required the Cabinet members to make the homes their principal residences for a year. There’s no information showing they failed to do that. None has been charged, much less convicted, of mortgage fraud. (James hasn’t been convicted either.)
What is James charged with?
James is one of three Democratic figures — along with Federal Reserve Board member Lisa Cook and Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif. — who have faced administration challenges over alleged mortgage fraud. Cook and Schiff deny the allegations as well.
Each stands accused of attesting on legal documents that they were seeking mortgages for houses that qualified for more favorable interest rates than they otherwise would have received. Declaring that a home is a principal residence, for instance, typically allows the borrower to secure a lower interest rate than if it’s a secondary residence. A secondary residence can secure a lower rate than an investment property does.
James’ indictment charges her with bank fraud and making false statements to a financial institution in connection with paperwork she filed for a house she purchased in Norfolk, Virginia.
According to the indictment, she signed a form that said she had to use the house as a second residence. Instead, the indictment said, James rented the house to a family of three.
James has maintained her innocence. News accounts and a letter from James’ attorney, written in April as the government was considering whether to file charges, stated that the renters were family members, and that in most years she did not charge them rent. The lawyer’s letter also said the government “cherry picked” paperwork and ignored other documents that accurately described her role.
Legal experts also say the bar for proving intent to deceive is high in cases like this, and the amount of money at stake would not normally lead to a prosecution. The indictment says James stood to save “approximately $17,837,” which would work out to $50 a month over the life of the 30-year loan, NBC News reported. If convicted, James could face up to 30 years in prison per count; up to a $1 million fine on each count; and forfeiture of the house.
What are the three Cabinet members accused of doing?
ProPublica obtained the signed mortgage forms for six houses belonging to the three Cabinet members. The outlet said it had located the documents “while examining financial disclosure forms, county real estate records and publicly available mortgage data provided by Hunterbrook Media.”
Each of the three Cabinet members’ scenarios is slightly different. But in each case, the Cabinet member and a spouse signed paperwork for one house they described as their principal residence, then later signed paperwork for another house that they also described as their principal residence.
According to ProPublica, the three Cabinet member examples were as follows:
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DeRemer and her husband signed forms for principal-residence mortgages in both Arizona (2017) and Oregon (2021).
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Duffy and his wife signed forms for principal-residence mortgages in both New Jersey (2021) and Washington, D.C. (2025).
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Zeldin and his wife signed principal-residence mortgages in New York (2007) and Washington, D.C. (2024).
ProPublica contacted each department that the Cabinet members represent, and each one, as well as the White House, denied any wrongdoing on behalf of the Cabinet members.
The terms of three Cabinet members’ agreements show no breaches
Based on our review and discussions with experts, signing two forms citing a different house as one’s “principal residence” doesn’t, on its own, amount to a breach of the agreements’ terms.
That’s because all six forms included an “occupancy” section saying the borrowers agreed to use the house as their “principal residence” within 60 days and for at least one year after the date of occupancy, “unless extenuating circumstances exist which are beyond” the borrower’s control.
“The occupancy covenant is only for one year,” said Adam Levitin, a Georgetown University law professor.
The three Cabinet members each signed a subsequent mortgage more than a year after signing the first one.
“If the later mortgage is for a property that is actually the borrower’s principal residence for the year after that mortgage, there’s no problem, and nothing needs to be amended with the first property’s mortgage,” Levitin said.
There’s also some wiggle room on having two principal residences simultaneously, Levitin said. “There are certainly circumstances in which a borrower might think of himself as having two or more principal residences, such as Mar-a-Lago and the White House” for Trump.
Assessing Koh’s characterization
Koh is wrong to say that any of the Cabinet members “committed mortgage fraud.” Not only have the Cabinet members not been charged with or convicted of any crimes, but also a plain reading of the mortgage documents would argue that signing two agreements listing different principal residences would not violate the agreements, because of the one-year clause.
Koh told PolitiFact that his comment’s focus was on the latter point, about the contrast in how these cases were being treated.
“To be clear, I think all of these accusations are a stretch at best, but I’m highlighting the hypocrisy and the administration’s failure to apply the same standard to all cases,” Koh said.
Despite his inaccurate wording, Levitin said it’s “reasonable” for Koh to point out that James and other Democrats are drawing more intense scrutiny than the three Cabinet members are for common — and rarely prosecuted — mortgage actions.
Our ruling
Koh said that as the Trump administration pursues mortgage fraud charges against Letitia James, “there are three Cabinet members who committed mortgage fraud that he’s just letting fly.”
Experts say mortgage fraud cases like the one against James are rarely prosecuted. But Koh’s description of the three Cabinet members’ situations is misleading.
ProPublica published documents that show that three Trump Cabinet members signed mortgage paperwork classifying separate residences as their principal residences. But the documents also show the mortgages required them to make the homes their principal residences for a year. There’s no information showing they failed to do that. None of the Cabinet members have been charged with or convicted of mortgage fraud.
The statement contains an element of truth but leaves out facts that would give a different impression, so we rate it Mostly False.