A grand jury is reportedly weighing criminal charges against Letitia James after Donald Trump’s recently appointed prosecutor in Virginia presented evidence against the Democratic attorney general of New York Attorney.
The president nominated his personal attorney Lindsey Halligan to U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia last month after he boasted of “firing” the district’s top prosecutor who resisted pressure from the administration to prosecute James and former FBI director James Comey.
Halligan, who has no prosecutorial experience, presented a case against Comey days later, and she has now personally delivered evidence against James to a grand jury, according to MSNBC.
Trump, Attorney General Pam Bondi and Department of Justice — now filled with loyalists and attorneys to dominate agencies that the president claims were weaponized against him — are also targeting other prominent Democratic officials as well as progressive fundraising groups and an array of ideological opponents the administration alleges are tied to acts of terrorism.
James has long been a target of the president, whose sprawling business empire was the subject of a yearslong investigation and blockbuster judgment from a New York judge that found Trump and his associates illegally enriched themselves by defrauding banks and investors as part of a decade-long scheme to secure favorable financing terms for some of his brand-building properties.
In August, a state appeals court determined that the crushing financial verdict from New York Justice Arthur Engoron — which has ballooned to more than $515 million, with growing interest — was “excessive.”
But the ruling only applies to the financial penalties. The court upheld Engoron’s findings that the president and his business partners committed brazen fraud — falling short of the vindication that the president sought through the courts to save him.
Bill Pulte, the chair of the Federal Housing Finance Authority, has accused James of falsifying documents and property records relating to homes she owns in New York, New Jersey and Virginia to obtain lower mortgage rates — ironically nearly the exact same thing a judge determined Trump and his business associates did with multiple properties. The Justice Department has confirmed an open investigation against James based on the allegations.
This is a developing story
