Hi, Mr. Pulte, could you take a couple questions?
Uh, what do you got?
I wanted to ask you about, um, Lisa Cook. I heard some of your interview on, on Fox News. If, if you don't mind, come over here.
Sure.
I was curious. I heard you, uh, talked about a second criminal referral for her.
Yeah.
Why the second criminal referral since she's already been fired?
Because once we dug in more, we found more. And anytime we find more, whether it's on a criminal suspect or otherwise, we try to report it to people. So we reported to the DOJ. She said that she had a second home, but then in her disclosures to the US government, she called it an investment and rental property.
Investments in rental properties are different than second homes. And back in that timeframe, 2021, where she took out these three mortgages, you had different rates for these different types of classifications. So it's very concerning and the DOJ will have to figure out what they do with that.
Do you think you are -- Do you think the President or the administration is going to name her replacement while this litigation is ongoing?
I have no clue. You'd have to ask the President that. My main focus is on getting rid of mortgage fraud and finding mortgage fraud no matter who commits it. If they commit it and we determine that it's within our purview to prosecute it, we will refer it over to the DOJ, and that's what I'm singularly focused on. So --
Are there, are there other government officials who are looking into --
I don't --
-- in terms of mortgage crimes?
We're looking at a lot of different things. We refer criminally people every day. Contrary to what people say, we refer people who are Democrats, Republicans, it doesn't matter. Uh, but we're not gonna be deterred, uh, from pursuing people. But the ones that we've made public or have been made public by other people are the only ones that we're prepared to talk about right now.
Okay.
Tom Dempsey with News Nation. Uh, the, the attorneys for Ms. Cook are saying this is all just an effort to get interest rates lowered and that there was never cause to begin with for her to be fired. What do you say in response to that?
Well, Ms. Cook is the one who filled out the applications, not me and not anybody else that I know. So she needs to account for why did she take these two mortgages out? She took out a Michigan loan and then two weeks later she goes and she takes out another loan, uh, for a property in Atlanta. She declares both of 'em as her primary residence.
Then you go back four months from that, she took out another loan. We're now finding on a third property saying that it was a second home when really she declared it as an investment property. So, you know, this really has nothing to do with the Fed. It has much to do with public officials. If you're gonna be in charge of the Federal Reserve, damn, you better sure know how to fill out a mortgage application.
And boy, it's awfully weird that she potentially saved a lot of money by making so-called clerical errors, which were not clerical errors.
Do you know if she's still getting paid by the Fed or, or how that's working while you guys bring this?
I don't know, but Jerome Powell, he's got an answer for why he's not coming out and saying this is bad. He's destroying the credibility to the Fed by not saying that mortgage fraud is bad. I mean, we have great career people. We have great people at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. We have great people at the Federal Housing Agency.
Why would somebody, who's Jerome Powell, not come out and say, "You know what, if Ms. Cook did this, she should resign?" So it's becoming more and more concerning by the day. And I say that because, you know, not only from a legal perspective with mortgages, but obviously the mortgage market is very dependent on the credibility of the Fed, and so it's concerning.
Thank you, Bill.
You got it. Thanks.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Pulte.
See you guys.