WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department has begun examining mortgage fraud allegations against Lisa Cook, the Federal Reserve governor who is challenging a Trump administration effort to remove her from her job in a move she says is designed to erode the central bank’s independence.
Investigators have issued subpoenas as part of an inquiry into Cook that was spawned by a criminal referral from the country’s top housing regulator, according to a person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to discuss the probe and spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press.
A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment on the probe, which was earlier reported by The Wall Street Journal.
“Predictably and recognizing the flaws in challenging their illegal firing of Governor Cook, the administration is scrambling to invent new justifications for its overreach. This Justice Department — perhaps the most politicized in American history — will do whatever President Trump demands,” Cook’s lawyer, Abbe David Lowell, said in a statement.
News of the investigation comes amid a high-stakes legal fight over President Donald Trump’s announcement last month that he was ousting Cook, an action she has said is being undertaken so that he can seize control over a central bank that is typically shielded from political pressure and tasked with making decisions about whether to raise or lower interest rates.