Prosecutor Tish James Charged for Allowing Her Niece to Live in Her Home

Photograph by Michael M. Santiago / Getty from New Yorker.

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In case you missed it, the prosecutor who convicted Trump of 34 felony counts is being charged with mortgage fraud, among other infractions. The charges against New York Attorney General Letitia (Tish) James come after a number of career prosecutors refused to seek an indictments for cases they saw as political retaliation with no real evidence. Here’s what happened.

The Claim Against Prosecutor Tish James

An indictment filed on October 9, 2025, by Prosecutor Lindsey Halligan alleges that Prosecutor Letitia James committed mortgage fraud when she took out a mortgage in 2020 for about $110,000 for a home in Virginia.

Prosecutors claim the mortgage agreement prohibited AG James from renting the home out to anyone. However, they allege she made “thousands of dollars” renting the home out to a family of three.

By allegedly failing to inform the mortgage company of her intent to rent out the property, the prosecutors say James cheated the bank out of interest. The interest rate would have been 3.815, instead of the 3 percent at which she was charged. This would have amounted to just over $19,000 over the life of the loan. James paid the loan off early four years later, and it does not appear she actually “rented” the home.

AG James, the Home and Her Niece

As New York Times reports, AG Tish James’s grandniece occupied the home, in question, and the niece testified to this under oath during the indictment hearing. Contrary to the charges, the niece did not agree that she had ever paid rent while living in the home in Norfolk, Virginia.

According to testimony from the niece and others, the mother of three had been experiencing rough times. Although prosecutors allege James “ceded control of the property” by “renting” it out, no funds exchanged hands between the niece and Prosector James.

Also, James’s agreement with the bank allegedly restricted her from “entering an agreement to rent the property.” “Renting” the property and “entering an agreement to rent the property” are not the same thing. The first is the act of renting out a property. The second is the act of entering into an agreement concerning renting the property.

There was no agreement between James and her niece about renting the apartment, and the apartment was not rented because, again, no money exchanged hands for rent.

Furthermore, this was not the first time the Trump Administration had tried to indict AG James on these charges. The original grand jury refused to charge her. Afterwards, Trump fired the prosecutor over the case and installed Prosecutor Lindsey Halligan, who has no background in criminal law.

Halligan retried the case in front of another grand jury. This time, the niece was not allowed to testify. Additionally, Halligan falsely alleged James did indeed “rent” the house out which James did not. This skewed the evidence in favor of the prosecution by disallowing the grand jury information to the real facts.

The Takeaway

New York Attorney General Letitia James has been charged with two counts of mortgage fraud. However, the evidence doesn’t appear to support the charges. Some have called this more of a persecution than prosecution, as an attempt for Donald Trump to get even after being convicted of 34 felony counts, many of which were based on systemic fraud within his businesses and organizations.

FOLLOW the author and educator Jermaine Reed, MFA on X @Jermaine Reed, MFA for his controversial but real hot takes.