By Chris Prentice and Marisa Taylor
WASHINGTON, Dec 19 (Reuters) – Days after being sworn in as President Donald Trump’s appointee at a top U.S. housing agency, Bill Pulte began cleaning house.
Since taking over the Federal Housing Finance Agency in March, Pulte has driven out hundreds of employees from the mortgage regulator and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Fortune 500 mortgage-buying companies he oversees. The brash scion of a homebuilding empire bearing his family’s name, Pulte has supplanted industry veterans with politically or personally connected advisors, including a business partner of Trump’s eldest son and a former registered sex offender who campaigned for the Republican president.
Pulte has also seized the microphone.
In an early move, he ordered staff to hand over control of the Fannie Mae account on X, the social media platform, according to four people familiar with his actions. He soon began using the account, as well as his own personal X profile, to trumpet the White House agenda and level accusations of mortgage fraud against prominent Democrats perceived to be political enemies of Trump. Pulte accompanied those accusations with criminal referrals to the Justice Department.
By favoring loyalty and personal ties over experience, and politicizing the once low-profile FHFA and the companies it supervises, Pulte risks undercutting the credibility of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, government-ethics specialists say. The government-sponsored enterprises, under FHFA conservatorship since the 2008 financial crisis, underpin the U.S. housing market by backing the majority of all mortgages.
“This reliance on a buddy system – in which people are getting into positions because of their political or personal connections – is unprecedented at these organizations,” said Richard Painter, a Bush administration ethics attorney who co-authored a book about ethical lapses in the banking industry and the 2008 crisis. “It’s a potentially explosive and dangerous situation that could be damaging not only to the mortgage industry but to our economy as a whole.”
Regulating the two companies is a core competency of the FHFA. Fannie specializes in buying mortgages from big banks, packaging them into securities and then selling those securities to create liquidity in the home-loan market. Freddie plays the same role for smaller lenders. Pulte has proposed some policy changes in the market, such as introducing a 50-year mortgage. That idea, aimed at making monthly loan payments more affordable than under the standard shorter terms, has drawn criticism from some quarters as it would mean more interest payments over the life of a loan.
But Pulte’s maneuvers have drawn attention mostly for reasons other than the workings of the mortgage industry.
Within Fannie and Freddie, some of his appointments have angered staffers who perceive a political agenda more focused on fighting Washington “wokism” than on the actual mortgage business. Pulte has used his status as a Trump appointee to promote cryptocurrency initiatives, a move some critics see as a conflict of interest because Trump’s family has significant investments in the sector and the president has sought to deregulate it.
Pulte’s accusations of fraud against political targets led the Government Accountability Office, the investigative agency of Congress, this month to say it would investigate whether Pulte abused his position and government resources in that effort. The GAO probe came at the behest of Democratic senators. Federal prosecutors in Maryland also began recently to review Pulte’s conduct in the investigation of Senator Adam Schiff, a California Democrat he accused of mortgage fraud.
In a recent post online, Attorney General Pam Bondi, who oversees federal prosecutors, wrote: “There is no investigation into Bill Pulte.”
Pulte didn’t respond to questions from Reuters for this report.
This examination of Pulte’s tenure is based on interviews with more than two dozen people familiar with the impact of his management at the FHFA and his role as chairman at Fannie and Freddie. Reuters also reviewed internal documents from the agency and the two companies as well as Pulte’s extensive social media postings.
Jonathan Coppage, a spokesperson for the FHFA, in an emailed statement to Reuters said Pulte’s leadership at the FHFA has created a “safer and sounder” mortgage sector. “Fannie and Freddie,” he added, “are now being run like standard businesses and not special interest welfare entities, so there is no room for waste, fraud, or abuse.”
Spokespersons at Fannie and Freddie didn’t respond to requests for comment.
On X, Pulte has justified his cuts at the mortgage giants as the elimination of “not core” positions and a reversal of “DEI nonsense,” a reference to employment policies that sought more inclusive and equitable workplaces. He has touted his hires, meanwhile, as recruitment of the “best and brightest.” He has defended his criminal referrals against officials including Schiff and New York Attorney General Letitia James as an urgent effort to eliminate fraud that’s damaging the mortgage industry.
Both James and Schiff have denied wrongdoing. A federal judge dismissed charges against James brought by a prosecutor after Pulte’s criminal referral, and two grand juries have subsequently declined to indict her. A spokesperson for the Justice Department declined to comment.
In the agency’s statement, the FHFA spokesperson didn’t answer specific questions about Pulte’s accusations of mortgage fraud.
Steven Cheung, a White House spokesperson, has told Reuters that criticism of Pulte’s tenure at FHFA is “a pathetic attempt to distract away from all of the victories being delivered for the American people.” He added that “Bill Pulte is one of the President’s most loyal and important advisors who is doing a great job.”
SHARED BUSINESS AND SOCIAL CIRCLES
Although his family originally hails from Michigan, where his grandfather’s construction company grew into one of the biggest homebuilders in the United States, Pulte was born in Florida, where he has moved in the same business and social circles as Trump. On his financial disclosure form ahead of his confirmation for the FHFA post, Pulte declared assets worth at least $190 million, mostly through stakes in home-service companies and Pulte Capital Partners, an investment firm at which he listed his position as chief executive.
In a February letter to a government ethics official, Pulte said he would step down from his roles at various investment vehicles including Pulte Capital Partners and Pulte Family Office, a related entity.
Pulte has been a regular presence at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, people familiar with the matter told Reuters, and is friendly with Donald Trump Jr, the president’s eldest son. Reuters couldn’t determine whether those ties led to Pulte’s nomination as FHFA boss, but some of his own appointments as regulator hail from the same social circles.
The FHFA spokesperson didn’t respond to a question about Pulte’s relationship with the Trumps or their acquaintances. The White House didn’t respond to questions about the matter, either.
After Pulte was confirmed as director last March, he installed himself as chairman of the board at both Fannie and Freddie. The move was unprecedented, surprising some staffers at both enterprises, accustomed to a formal remove between the regulator and the companies.
It also prompted the FHFA’s inspector general, an independent internal watchdog, to review whether the self-appointment was a conflict of interest, according to three people familiar with the matter. Tensions with that office increased when Pulte, breaking with standard procedures, circumvented the inspector before making the criminal referrals, Reuters reported in October
The White House later fired the inspector general for reasons it hasn’t disclosed. Joe Allen, the former inspector general, didn’t reply to requests for comment from Reuters.
Pulte, in an X post on Thursday, referenced Reuters’ inquiries about his appointment as chair of Fannie and Freddie. He wrote that Allen in April “confirmed to the Federal Housing Finance Agency that the Director acting as Chairman is legal.”
The inspector general’s office, for its part, appeared to contradict Pulte.
In a statement to Reuters, also on Thursday, a spokesperson said “it is not the role of the FHFA-OIG to provide legal advice to FHFA.” The statement added that in April, when Congress asked the former inspector general about the legality of the director serving as chair, “he referred them back to the agency as best positioned to provide the factual and legal basis for its decisions.”
Pulte revamped Fannie and Freddie’s boards, ultimately removing 14 directors, and replacing most of them, at the two companies. He also implemented a series of management changes, including the chief executives at both companies.
More broadly, Pulte announced layoffs of “not core” employees, including staffers responsible for diversity efforts and ethics enforcement, according to public records and statements by Pulte. Three people familiar with the changes within Fannie said some staff there were disturbed when Pulte aides earlier this year told them, as they prepared marketing materials related to mortgage financing, not to include too many Latino or African-American families in their visuals. The marketing, the aides stressed, needed to reflect the administration’s shift away from DEI, these people said.
The FHFA spokesperson denied the incident. “No one at the Federal Housing Finance Agency ever said this,” he wrote, “it is completely made up.”
On their own, personnel changes are common under a new boss. Still, the nature of Pulte’s appointments has bothered some staffers at Fannie and Freddie because they have included some aides with little experience in the mortgage sector. Still others are perceived to represent potential conflicts – in one case because a new board member as recently as January shared a common financial interest with a Pulte family investment office.
In April, Pulte named Omeed Malik, founder of venture fund 1789 Capital and a prominent Trump donor, to Fannie’s board. Trump Jr is a partner in the fund, based in Palm Beach and known for its conservative bent. Months earlier, according to a release by the family investment office in which Pulte was quoted as chairman, the office had invested in GrabAGun, a Texas-based firearm retailer that Malik helped go public this year. Trump Jr is also a board member there.
“Normal government ethics say you shouldn’t have these shared financial interests,” James Lockhart, who served as the first-ever FHFA director, under both Republican and Democratic administrations, told Reuters.
The FHFA spokesperson, without elaborating, said Pulte hasn’t owned any shares in GrabAGun “since being in Government.” He didn’t explain if the Pulte family office sold the stake in the company after Pulte joined the Trump administration.
Trump Jr, 1789 Capital and GrabAGun didn’t respond to requests for comment. In response to questions from Reuters, a lawyer for Malik declined to make him available for an on-record interview.
“THERE WAS NOBODY THERE”
Other Pulte personnel decisions have also raised eyebrows.
Earlier this year, Reuters reported, Pulte enlisted Mark Zarkin, a Michigan restaurateur with no significant experience in the mortgage sector and who had once been convicted of a felony sex offense, as a consultant to the two mortgage companies. A judge had later vacated the felony conviction.
Zarkin didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Reuters couldn’t identify exactly what role Zarkin has performed, but three people familiar with his presence said he often accompanied Pulte at Fannie offices and in March escorted a film crew there to shoot footage that soon after was shown by Fox News.
The footage, the people said, was filmed on a Monday, a day when many employees typically work from home. Pulte on camera showed empty cubicles and made comments, considered inaccurate and disparaging by some staffers, about truant workers. “We’ve got this big beautiful area where employees are supposed to work,” Pulte said in the Fox segment. “There was nobody there.”
In an email, a Fox News spokesperson said the video it used was supplied by the FHFA and that it didn’t work with Zarkin.
The FHFA spokesperson said Zarkin is currently not an employee or consultant to the agency, Fannie or Freddie. He didn’t answer follow-up questions about any role Zarkin may have held earlier in the year.
Another early move by Pulte was his demand for access to Fannie’s X account, the four people familiar with the order told Reuters. Previously, posts by the company on social media were vetted by experts and lawyers. But after internal discussions, these people said, the staffers complied.
The FHFA spokesperson said: “In 2025, it is very common to use social media platforms like X to communicate with the public.”
Soon, Pulte began using the platform to promote Trump’s policies.
His posts, some staffers believe, blur the lines between Pulte’s political views and his role as a regulator. Reuters couldn’t determine whether Pulte himself has posted from the Fannie account, but the account has reposted some of Pulte’s own X writings regarding FHFA initiatives, including his claims of widespread fraud in the mortgage industry.
At times, people familiar with his activities told Reuters, Pulte’s prolific posts led staffers within Fannie and Freddie to learn of new policy initiatives even before they had been analyzed, let alone announced, at the companies themselves.
Last month, for instance, Pulte on X said that “Thanks to President Trump, we are indeed working on The 50-year-mortgage – a complete game changer.” The idea was pitched as a way to broaden access to a mortgage market currently dominated by 30-year loans. But it was promptly criticized by staffers, economists and mortgage industry experts, some of whom said it would burden homeowners with more debt and expose lenders to higher risk.
The idea hasn’t been implemented.
Then there was his announcement that Fannie and Freddie would wade into an industry that President Trump, once a skeptic, has embraced – cryptocurrency. In October, Reuters reported that Trump’s family reaped more than $800 million from crypto sales in the first half of 2025. During that period, the Department of Justice axed its crypto enforcement team and the administration’s banking regulators relaxed guidance for banks regarding the historically volatile currencies.
In June, Pulte posted that he had ordered Fannie and Freddie to make adjustments so borrowers could count cryptocurrency among their assets when applying for loans. “After significant studying, and in keeping with President Trump’s vision to make the United States the crypto capital of the world, today I ordered the Great Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to prepare their businesses to count cryptocurrency as an asset for a mortgage,” he wrote.
The directive caused confusion.
Some staffers perceived yet another conflict of interest in a measure that seeks mass-market acceptance for a sector in which the president’s family has significant investments. The order, one person familiar with the response at Fannie and Freddie said, led both companies to scramble for ways to implement it, particularly because many mainstream lenders remain uncertain about the risks that still plague volatile cryptocurrencies.
A functional plan still hasn’t been formulated, the person added.
The FHFA spokesperson, without providing details, in the statement wrote: “Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have made great progress with implementing cryptocurrency.”
(Editing by Paulo Prada.)
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