Letitia James, the embattled New York Attorney General now facing a Justice Department prosecution, has only herself to blame, according to a recent op-ed by a prominent liberal legal analyst.
Elie Honig, a former prosecutor and current CNN legal analyst, criticized James, a Democrat, for fueling what he described as a “retributive mess” of politically charged prosecutions. He argued that her actions ultimately led to the current charges, which allege she falsified information on federal forms to secure favorable mortgage terms for multiple properties.
James previously prosecuted President Donald Trump for mortgage fraud, successfully obtaining a $454 million state judgment that is currently under appeal. She vowed to “get Trump” during her 2018 campaign for office, and after she won, she made good on charging him and his company with something.
“It’s a fact, beyond reasonable dispute, that Letitia James weaponized her official power as New York’s attorney general to pursue Donald Trump for political purposes,” Honig writes in New York Magazine. “It’s equally clear that the Trump administration is now targeting James for payback. The downward spiral of prosecutorial retribution has begun, and there will be no winners.”
The Trump administration’s prosecution of Letitia James alleges that she intentionally misrepresented her father as her husband and falsely claimed a Virginia property as her primary residence, among other violations. Her legal team has dismissed the accusations as innocent clerical mistakes.
Meanwhile, James’ press office has issued defiant statements condemning the case as a “weaponization” of the Justice Department—ironically echoing the same charge of political lawfare that Trump leveled against her during her prosecution of him in 2023.
“Before she had access to any evidence, James declared conclusively that Trump ‘engaged in a pattern and practice of money laundering’ and ‘can be indicted for criminal offenses,’” Honig goes on. “The day after she won office, still having seen no actual evidence, the new AG exulted, ‘We’re going to definitely sue him. We’re going to be a real pain in the ass. He’s going to know my name personally.’ For what? Who knows. Just something.”
In the Trump real estate case, the fraud charges were so “flimsy” that appellate courts now seem poised to significantly reduce the financial penalties, according to legal expert Elie Honig. He notes that, similarly, the Trump administration will need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Letitia James acted with criminal intent in her case.
Honig also points out that James, a Democrat twice elected statewide in New York, is likely to benefit from a sympathetic jury pool in her home state. “James was wrong to target Trump politically from her perch as AG. But that gives Trump no license to pay her back with an equally ill-motivated prosecution. Weaponization is no antidote to weaponization. James started this retributive mess, but this is no way to end it,” he wrote.
