President Donald Trump said a Federal Reserve Board governor who has refused to lower interest rates “must resign, now!!!”
Lisa Cook has also been accused of mortgage fraud by Federal Housing Finance Agency Director William Pulte, who sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi saying Cook “falsified bank documents and property records to acquire more favorable loan terms, potentially committing mortgage fraud.”
Pulte referred her for criminal prosecution.
Pulte obtained Cook’s mortgage documents and asked the Justice Department to review the matter.
According to Pulte’s letter, Cook took out a mortgage on a house in Michigan represented to be her principal residence. Shortly later, she took out a loan on a condominium in Atlanta that she also described as her principal residence.
The letter says she listed the Atlanta condo as a rental property in 2022, despite having said in mortgage documents it would serve as her primary residence.
Then-President Joe Biden appointed Cook to a 14-year term ending in 2038. She has a vote on the Fed’s Board of Governors, which determines the Fed’s interest-rate setting.
While Cook has voted against lowering interest rates, she has said “at some point” the time will come to do so.
The president has repeatedly pressured Fed Chairman Jerome Powell and the other governors to lower rates immediately.