Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook attends the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City’s 2025 Jackson Hole economic symposium, “Labor Markets in Transition: Demographics, Productivity, and Macroeconomic Policy” in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, U.S., August 23, 2025.
Jim Urquhart | Reuters
Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte on Thursday night said that he had filed a second criminal referral with the Department of Justice against Federal Reserve Board Governor Lisa Cook, whom President Donald Trump is trying to fire.
Pulte said in a post on X that the new referral relates to her mortgage for a condominium in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and alleged misrepresentations about that condo and two homes she owns in government ethics filings during her time as a Fed governor.
“3 strikes and you’re out,” Pulte tweeted about his referral to the DOJ.
His post included images of his letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi and top DOJ official Ed Martin, laying out the allegations about Cook.
The referral implicitly addresses arguments that Trump does not have the power to legally remove Cook from the board for cause because Pulte’s first criminal referral relates to conduct that allegedly occurred before she joined the Fed.
Earlier Thursday, Cook sued Trump, asking a federal judge in Washington, D.C., to block the president from his unprecedented move to boot her from the central bank.
CNBC has requested comment from a spokeswoman for Cook’s attorney and the Fed about Pulte’s new criminal referral.
Trump earlier in the week cited the first criminal referral Pulte made against Cook, which related to purported false claims on mortgage applications for two homes, in a letter notifying her that he was firing her.
Pulte, who was appointed to lead the FHFA by Trump, has acted as an attack dog on the president’s behalf against the Fed, Fed Chairman Jerome Powell, and Cook in recent weeks.
Bill Pulte, nominated to be the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, testifies during a Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., Feb. 27, 2025.
Annabelle Gordon | Reuters
Trump for months has demanded, without success so far, that the central bank cut interest rates. Before saying he was firing Cook, Trump had seriously considered trying to fire Powell.
Pulte previously said that Cook signed mortgage documents for properties in Michigan and Georgia, which she claimed were each her primary residence, “in order to potentially secure lower interest rates and more favorable loan terms.”
His earlier allegation led the DOJ to open a criminal investigation of Cook, the first Black woman to serve as a Fed governor.
Pulte on Thursday said that in April 2021, “Cook entered a 15-year mortgage for a condominium in [Cambridge], representing it as her ‘Second Home.’ “
“Only eight months later, on December 1, 2021, Cook signed an ethics form with the U.S. Government that this property was an ‘investment/rental property,’ ” Pulte wrote.
But “in subsequent filings from 2022 to 2025, Cook consistently listed this property as an investment/rental property, not a second home,” he wrote.
“Representing the property as a second home may have allowed Cook to secure a lower ‘Second Home’ mortgage down payment and rates, as investment properties typically carry higher down payments and higher rates due to increased risk,” Pulte wrote.
He said that Cook allegedly misrepresented her property in Atlanta on disclosure forms from 2022 through 2025 “as her residence, despite evidence suggesting it was being rented out to tenants.”
“Similarly, Cook declared in a 2025 government filing that her Ann Arbor, [Michigan] property was her personal residence, however, we have reason to believe that as of 2025, the Ann Arbor property is being used as a rental property, not a personal residence,” Pulte tweeted.
“These inconsistencies appear Cook made additional, multiple false representations, including to the U.S. Government, regarding the status of her mortgages and properties.”
