A new report has identified Bill Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), as being responsible for calling President Trump’s attention to post a controversial meme depicting him as a Christ-like healer.
According to an Axios report sourced from two unnamed “advisers who spoke to the president about the image,” Pulte showed the meme to Trump last weekend when they spent time together at the president’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. The meme was first published online in February by Nick Adams, a conservative influencer, and it is unclear whether Pulte displayed it on his phone for Trump’s viewing or if he emailed it to him.
The meme sparked an outrage from many religious conservatives, forcing Trump to remove the post from his Truth Social page. He claimed that he thought it showed him as a doctor, as opposed to a religious figure.
Pulte, a major donor to Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, has exercised considerable influence over Trump since becoming FHFA director. He was reportedly the driving force behind the strategy of trying to prosecute the president’s political enemies with mortgage fraud accusations and had echoed the president’s efforts to force Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell from his job. Trump tasked Pulte with trying to convince homebuilders to create more inventory, even though the FHFA has no regulatory responsibility over the homebuilding sector.
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