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Mark Schiefelbein\/AP<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n On Friday, Sens. Elizabeth Warren<\/span> and Ron Wyden sent a letter to Bill Pulte, the embattled director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, to demand information about a mysterious Pulte donation recently uncovered<\/a> by Mother Jones<\/em>. The donation, they write<\/a>, raises questions about whether Pulte\u2019s nonprofit sent money to Donald Trump while disguising it as charity to the poor.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThese facts raise serious concerns that Team Pulte Inc. may have illegally funneled cash out of a charity to support President Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n Bill Pulte\u2019s charity, Team Pulte, sent $65,000 to a nonprofit called \u201cOne World Love LLC\u201d in 2023 to help the \u201cunderserved,\u201d according to the charity\u2019s tax filings<\/a>. But our February reporting found that One World Love does not appear to be a nonprofit and is instead a corporate entity with ties to the law firm that represented President Donald Trump in his efforts to prove election fraud and to avoid paying damages after the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cOne World does not appear to be an actual nonprofit devoted to underserved individuals,\u201d the senators write in their letter. \u201cThese facts raise serious concerns that Team Pulte Inc. may have illegally funneled cash out of a charity to support President Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n Mother Jones<\/em> reported that there are several inconsistencies between what\u2019s disclosed in Team Pulte\u2019s tax filings and what is known from public records.\u00a0<\/p>\n First, Team Pulte lists One World Love as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit\u2014but the IRS database of nonprofits includes no entity with this name. Second: The tax identification number Team Pulte lists for One World Love doesn\u2019t seem to exist. And third,\u00a0the address Team Pulte lists for One World Love is an unrelated apartment building, while the address listed by the corporate entity itself appears to belong to the Binnall Law Group, which represented Donald Trump and where the president accrued millions in legal bills during his reelection effort.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The senators note in their letter that \u201cwillful and knowing delivery or disclosure to the IRS of a false or fraudulent document is also a federal crime.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n The senators also sent a version of this letter to the head of Team Pulte, Joshua Hinkle. They ask both Pulte and Hinkle to explain these apparent misstatements on the charity\u2019s federal tax filings. They note that the rules that govern 501(c)(3)s are clear in that no part of their earnings may go to the benefit of a private individual and that \u201cwillful and knowing delivery or disclosure to the IRS of a false or fraudulent document is also a federal crime.\u201d<\/p>\n Neither the FHFA nor Hinkle were immediately available for comment, but we will update this story if they respond.<\/p>\n The letter is the latest in a series of controversies involving Pulte, who, despite leading a traditionally low-profile agency, has vaulted to prominence through aggressive efforts to assist Trump\u2019s attempts to use federal power against political foes.<\/p>\n Pulte has made referrals to the Justice Department in search of criminal investigations into figures including Lisa Cook, a Federal Reserve governor whom Trump has tried to fire; Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.); and Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), all for allegations of crimes committed when they sought housing mortgages. All deny wrongdoing.<\/p>\n Trump allies in the DOJ acted on those letters and launched investigations\u2014and in James\u2019 case, a short-lived criminal case<\/a> tossed last year by a federal judge in Virginia. Pulte recently attempted to spur a new investigation into James. He reportedly sent<\/a> new referral letters to Trump-nominated US attorneys in Florida and Illinois charging that James made misrepresentations in home insurance filings that affected insurance companies based in those states.<\/p>\n But his efforts have so far floundered, and Pulte now faces withering scrutiny into his own conduct. FHFA\u2019s inspector general and federal prosecutors have reportedly<\/a> looked into Pulte\u2019s office\u2019s handling of the mortgage fraud investigation into Schiff. The Government Accountability Office has said<\/a> it is running its own probe into whether Pulte misused his position to access mortgage information on Trump foes. <\/p>\n\n
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