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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   7507 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 17, 2025

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So, my debut post. I've been lurking here for some time and I have decided to experiment with some public posting.

The culture war issue on my mind is the federal prosecution of NY State AG Letitia James. A summary, from my perspective:

  1. She more or less campaigned for office with "Get Trump!" as one of her campaign promises.

  2. Upon taking office, she and her team went through some of Trump's deals for the purpose of looking for grounds to pursue a claim against him.

  3. She and her team discovered that in one of his real estate deals, he had supplied arguably exaggerated figures for property he had used as collateral for a loan.

  4. The State of New York sued Trump in the general trial court making use of a consumer fraud statute which, until then, had been mainly used against businesses that take advantage of individual consumers (i.e. not deals between sophisticated businesses). This consumer fraud statute did not require proof of damages, which was helpful to the AG's efforts since Trump and his organization had paid the loan back in full and with interest.

  5. The trial court awarded a judgment against Trump for hundreds of millions of dollars, a judgment which was later reversed on appeal.

  6. This lawsuit had been one of numerous other "Get Trump!" legal activities, civil and criminal, in multiple jurisdictions.

  7. After Trump was re-elected, a Trump loyalist with access to federal home loan files went through Letitia James' files and discovered arguable fraudulent statements in her mortgage applications for certain properties. Letitia James was referred for possible prosecution and ultimately indicted for bank fraud.

  8. Normally in situations like this, the mortgage applicant is not prosecuted. Rather, they are required to pay the higher interest rates which would would have been required had the application been completed accurately.

Personally, my reaction to this series of events is one of satisfaction. I was outraged by the lawfare campaign against Trump and it seemed to me that AG James activities were an abuse of her office. The prosecution of James strikes me as a reasonable tit-for-tat, necessary to deter the Blue Tribe from future abuses. The most charitable interpretation I can think of with respect to these lawsuits is that they are a form of "Nazi punching," i.e. the idea that if you are dealing with genocidal psychopaths, it's reasonable to oppose them By Any Means Necessary. But of course, as others have pointed out here, when you combine (1) it's okay to punch Nazis; and (2) my out-group are, generally speaking, led by Nazis, the net result falls somewhere between "counterproductive" and "civil war."

What's also interesting to me is that for the most part, the media coverage has downplayed points 1-6 from above even to the extent of completely ignoring them in certain cases, giving the impression that Trump is just gratuitously using the justice system to target his political enemies. (Yes, this is the "boo outgroup" part of my post.)

So this brings me to my main question: What will happen next? Given that the Blue Tribe members (apparently) feel that they are the victims of a vicious unprovoked lawfare attack, will they decide to retaliate at the next opportunity? Are we about to enter an era where every outgoing president preemptively pardons himself and all of his associates; conservative businessmen with political aspirations avoid contact with New York and California; and liberal businessmen similarly avoid Florida and Texas? Probably this is an exaggeration, but I would guess that the Blue Tribe is thirsty for revenge and I could easily see this lawfare business escalating.

A secondary question: Perhaps, much like the mainstream media, I am omitting important context from my summary. Are there additional facts I should consider which would (or should) change the way I see this lawfare business? In one article I read (I think it was the New York Times) the point was made that the fraud alleged against Trump was much bigger than that alleged against Letitia James. But to me, this does not seem like an important distinction because the key similarity is that in both cases, it seems that the authorities chose a target for political reasons and then went looking for arguable wrongdoing by that person. (As opposed to starting with the wrongdoing and then looking to see who was responsible.)

A secondary question: Perhaps, much like the mainstream media, I am omitting important context from my summary. Are there additional facts I should consider which would (or should) change the way I see this lawfare business?

The critical point you are ignoring is that Trump was guilty, but James appears to be innocent. The behaviour she has been indicted for is applying for a mortgage on the basis that the house on Peronne Avenue would be a secondary residence when she was in fact intending to rent it out. James claims that she allowed a family member to live in the house in exchange for a small contribution to utilities and maintenance, and that she accurately described her plans to the bank. If James is telling the truth, then no crime. The evidence that would allow me to determine who is telling the truth here is not public, but we do know that the career AUSAs assigned to prosecute the case declined to do so, and that the Trump-appointed US Attorney resigned rather than overruling them.

AFAIK, no President of the United States has previously ordered the malicious prosecution of someone they should have known was innocent.

Normally in situations like this, the mortgage applicant is not prosecuted.

As an entirely separate point, this is a problem. Primary residence fraud is not victimless - among other things it defeats the homeownership-promotion mission of Fannie and Freddie. But because it is almost never prosecuted it appears to be common.

The critical point you are ignoring is that Trump was guilty, but James appears to be innocent. The behaviour she has been indicted for is applying for a mortgage on the basis that the house on Peronne Avenue would be a secondary residence when she was in fact intending to rent it out. James claims that she allowed a family member to live in the house in exchange for a small contribution to utilities and maintenance, and that she accurately described her plans to the bank

Here are some excerpts from the indictment document:

The loan was originated by OVM Financial under a signed Second Home Rider, which required JAMES, as the sole borrower to occupy and use the property as her secondary residence, and prohibited its use as a timesharing or other shared ownership arrangement or agreement that requires her to either rent the property or give any other person any control over the occupancy or use of the property.

JAMES' Universal Property application for homeowners' insurance indicated "owner-occupied non-seasonal use," further misrepresenting the intended use of the property.

So my first question to you is this: Do you accept that these are substantially accurate descriptions of the documents that James signed?

James claims that she allowed a family member to live in the house in exchange for a small contribution to utilities and maintenance and that she accurately described her plans to the bank

AFAIK, no President of the United States has previously ordered the malicious prosecution of someone they should have known was innocent.

This raises a couple questions:

  1. So in your view, it doesn't count as "renting" if you allow a family member to live in a property in exchange for a modest, below-market payment?

  2. Do you normally assign a person's self-serving uncorroborated claims regarding their alleged wrongdoing enough credibility to conclude that the person "appears" to be or is "known" to be innocent?

Note the slight of hand in paragraph 6 of the indictment that you quote, emphasis added:

The loan was originated by OVM Financial under a signed Second Home Rider, which required JAMES, as the sole borrower to occupy and use the property as her secondary residence, and prohibited its use as a timesharing or other shared ownership arrangement or agreement that requires her to either rent the property or give any other person any control over the occupancy or use of the property.

I assume it is not in dispute that James did not use the property as a timeshare or other shared ownership arrangement. The critical text does not prohibit James from "renting" the property, it prohibits her from entering into an agreement that requires her to rent it (or to give another control over the occupancy or use of the property). James' behavior is only violation of that paragraph if she went beyond renting and entered into an agreement with her family member that required her to to rent to them or gave the that family member control over the occupancy or use of the property.

Of course, it's also not hard to look up the standard Fannie Mae Second Home Rider which provides, in relevant part:

6. Occupancy. Borrower must occupy and use the Property as Borrower’s second home. Borrower will maintain exclusive control over the occupancy of the Property, including short-term rentals, and will not subject the Property to any timesharing or other shared ownership arrangement or to any rental pool or agreement that requires Borrower either to rent the Property or give a management firm or any other person or entity any control over the occupancy or use of the Property. Borrower will keep the Property available primarily as a residence for Borrower’s personal use and enjoyment for at least one year after the date of this Security Instrument, unless Lender otherwise agrees in writing, which consent will not be unreasonably withheld, or unless extenuating circumstances exist that are beyond Borrower’s control.

Another way the renting may have been legal is if the lender agreed in writing to permit her renting.

Note the slight of hand in paragraph 6 of the indictment that you quot

Thanks for pointing this out.

I assume it is not in dispute that James did not use the property as a timeshare or other shared ownership arrangement

I would assume that as well.

Borrower will keep the Property available primarily as a residence for Borrower’s personal use and enjoyment for at least one year after the date of this Security Instrument

Feel free to correct me, but it doesn't seem that James ever kept the property "primarily as a residence for Borrower's personal use and enjoyment" or ever intended to do so.

Another way the renting may have been legal is if the lender agreed in writing to permit her renting.

Yes, if she can produce such a writing, I would say that the case is on shaky ground at best.

i suspect such a thing is unlikely to appear because the lender is probably repackaging the mortgages to fannie mae (or something similar) and that likely violates the agreement between this third party and the lender. but it might be possible someone trying to bump their numbers gave a wink to James that she could do this.

Apparently, a blogger may have originally raised the problem with James's loan and he has a write up about the ongoing court case here: https://whitecollarfraud.com/2025/11/18/letitia-jamess-motion-to-dismiss-backfires-her-own-exhibit-proves-the-fraud-she-claims-doesnt-exist/

i suspect such a thing is unlikely to appear because the lender is probably repackaging the mortgages to fannie mae (or something similar) and that likely violates the agreement between this third party and the lender.

If nothing else, it seems like the sort of thing where the lender is unlikely to want to spend time and energy writing up something like this since it makes life more complicated. Besides, I'm pretty sure that the reality of the situation is that when people plan to rent out the property, they don't bother to seek written permission. Rather they, just sign the paperwork and then do whatever they want and nobody cares. (Eventually, if there is an audit, they might have to pay some extra interest retroactively or something.) Just as I am pretty confident that in Trump's situation, it's pretty normal for people to exaggerate when describing their collateral, the bank does an independent appraisal, and perhaps they adjust the loan terms as a result.

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