Where’s the Local Media on This National Story?
by James A. Bacon
A big national story has landed in Virginia, and state media, which could help the public sift through conflicting charges and countercharges, has been totally silent.
In a 2022 trial heard around the world, New York Attorney General Letitia James famously secured a $354 million judgment against Donald Trump and the Trump Organization for submitting inflated property valuations to secure favorable loans. Trump and his defenders claimed that the valuations were subjective, the loans were repaid, and the prosecution was purely political.
Now Trump is president and he’s retaliating against his tormenters. In a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi, Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) Director William Pulte accused James of playing fast and loose in a real estate transaction of her own. It appears that in a 2023 application for a $220,000 mortgage, James declared that she intended to occupy a Norfolk, Va., house as her “primary residence.” But she lives in New York, and she has conceded that her niece lives in the modest, single-family dwelling. Read the details in this New York Post account.
Most recently, a report of irregularities has surfaced of James’ involvement in a 2008 real estate transaction in Martinsville, Va. Documents show her as a co-purchaser of a single-family home on a “final foreclosure accounting” (her name was misspelled as Lititua) but her name did not appear on the deed as it should have. The report could not identify a connection between James and the other buyers but noted that her mother resides in Martinsville.
So, James stands accused of submitting inaccurate information in real estate-related legal documents — just as she charged Trump of doing, though on a much smaller scale. As with Trump, there is no evidence that anyone was harmed from the alleged (though heavily documented) misstatement.
James has responded to the revelations in turn by accusing Trump of abusing his authority. “Donald Trump’s weaponization of the federal government continues to careen out of control — and now they are using cherry-picked information to attack the Attorney General. We will have more to share on these political attacks.”
My purpose here is not to take one side or the other. I take a cynical view on controversies of this sort. I trust neither side until there has been an opportunity for all the facts to come out. Most national media spin like mad, cherry-pick data, and craft one-sided talking points. The New York Post is a pro-Trump newspaper. The cheerleaders for James were anti-Trump. To seek the truth, the public must sift through all the claims and counter-claims.
Local media could help do that. Reporters in Norfolk and Martinsville could use their detailed knowledge of their communities to verify or falsify the details reported by national media, identify the local players involved in the real estate transactions, establish James’ relationship with those individuals, uncover motives, and provide context.
Is there any truth to the allegations against James?
Did she violate state law?
Given her prosecution of Trump, can her actions be seen as hypocritical?
Conversely, if she was using her credit worthiness to help relatives or friends of the family obtain houses, could her actions be interpreted as selfless even if technically illegal?
It would be helpful to have answers to those questions as we appraise the cesspool that is national politics. Local media normally love a juicy scandal. Sadly, the Virginian-Pilot, which has republished plenty of wire stories about the Trump-James confrontation, has not yet reported this one. (I’ll let the Martinsville Bulletin off the hook for the moment, for the revelation of the Martinsville transaction is so new.)
One is left to wonder why local newspapers and television stations are so disinterested.
