Weapons of Mass Deception: Letitia James’ Campaign Disclosures

As New York Attorney General Letitia James pursues others for financial deception, her own campaign filings reveal a pattern of luxury spending masked by deceptive accounting. While securing a $355 million judgment against Donald Trump for what she called financial fraud, James’s campaign has perfected its own system of selective disclosure – one that deliberately obscures how donor money flows to high-end resorts, private jets, and luxury accommodations.

Our previous investigation exposed James’s campaign’s systematic abuse of donor funds for luxury travel. Now, a fresh examination of campaign finance records through 2024-25 reveals an even more brazen pattern of deceptive disclosure. The campaign’s creative accounting hit new heights with inexplicable charges like $5,000 in taxi fares during a Martha’s Vineyard getaway – on an island smaller than Manhattan – and a carefully sanitized filing that stripped the word “Casino” from a Detroit gambling resort’s name. These aren’t isolated incidents but part of a calculated pattern designed to shield luxury spending from public scrutiny through strategic mislabeling and selective disclosure.

The Casino That Wasn’t (According to Campaign Filings)

The campaign’s deceptive filings reached a new level when documenting James’s $917.70 stay at Detroit’s MotorCity Casino Hotel. Records show the campaign deliberately scrubbed the word “Casino” from this 400-room luxury gambling resort’s name, listing it only as “Motor City Hotel” – a glaring omission that obscured the true nature of where donor money was being spent. This wasn’t careless paperwork or an innocent abbreviation. The campaign methodically sanitized the resort’s identity, transforming what is unmistakably a casino destination into what appears on paper as just another business hotel. By strategically erasing a single word, the campaign buried the uncomfortable reality that campaign funds were flowing to a gambling establishment.

Letitia James Campaign Spending Disclosure MoterCity Casino Hotel

Martha’s Vineyard: Where Crime Never Takes a Vacation

When New York’s summer heat becomes unbearable, James’s campaign somehow finds urgent business in more temperate locales. The 2024 Martha’s Vineyard expenses are particularly striking, showing substantial charges during peak season:

Letitia James Campaign Spending Disclosure Martha's Vineyard

The campaign’s taxi charges on Martha’s Vineyard defy credibility. Records show an astronomical $5,191.68 paid to “Blue Fin Taxi” (a convenient misspelling of the island’s Blue Fish Taxi service) during a single month – an amount that strains any reasonable explanation. On an island so small you can traverse it in 45 minutes, these charges would require logging hundreds of miles of travel to justify. At Martha’s Vineyard’s standard rates of $10-15 per mile, someone would need to be circling this 87-square-mile island multiple times daily to rack up such expenses. The math simply doesn’t add up: accumulating over $5,000 in taxi fares on an island only 9 miles at its widest point suggests either astonishingly wasteful spending of donor money or something more troubling about how these expenses were documented.

The pattern continues year after year. In 2023:

Letitia James Campaign Spending Disclosure Martha's Vineyard Year 2023

The creative classification extends to a peculiar “staff retreat” expense at the Edgar Hotel in September – coincidentally during one of the island’s most desirable times to visit, just after the peak summer crowds depart but while the weather remains perfect. One might wonder what urgent campaign business required staff to retreat to one of the nation’s most exclusive vacation destinations rather than utilizing any of New York State’s countless conference facilities. The campaign offers no explanation for why donor funds were spent sending staff to an island getaway spot where even modest accommodations routinely command premium rates during shoulder season.

This practice dates back to at least 2021:

Letitia James Campaign Spending Disclosure Martha's Vineyard Summer 2021

What’s particularly striking is how identical types of stays receive different categorizations – sometimes as “Office,” other times as “Lodging.” These examples from recent years show a pattern of scheduling “official business” at premium vacation destinations during peak seasons, though the practice may extend further back.

Somos Conference: The Caribbean Tradition Continues

The pattern of creative expense reporting is perhaps most evident in James’s continued attendance at the annual Somos conference, where New York politicians somehow always manage to “address Hispanic community issues” from sunny Caribbean beaches each November, when Puerto Rico’s tourist season peaks. The 2024 conference charges follow the same playbook seen in previous years:

Letitia James Campaign Spending Puerto Rico Year 2024

The campaign’s 2023 Puerto Rico expenses showcase even more brazen manipulation. A single conference stay at the Hotel Caribe was split into three separate charges totaling $9,186, each mysteriously categorized differently despite identical explanations:

  • October 26, 2023: $2,147 (Category: “Office,” Explanation: “Conference stay”)
  • November 1, 2023: $3,581 (Category: “Lodging,” Explanation: “Conference stay”)
  • November 8, 2023: $3,458 (Category: “Transportation,” Explanation: “Conference stay”)

Letitia James Campaign Spending Puerto Rico Year 2023

Not satisfied with one luxury resort in 2023, the campaign simultaneously booked over $2,500 in charges at the Condado Palm Inn – again split between “Lodging” and “Office” categories despite being made on the same day for the same stated purpose.
Condado Palm Inn – November 14, 2023:

  • $1,267 categorized as “Lodging” – Explanation: “Conference attendance”
  • $1,246 categorized as “Office” – Explanation: “Conference attendance”
  • Same day, same venue, same explanation, different categories
  • Total: $2,513 for a single stay

The campaign’s luxury Puerto Rico stays extended far beyond conference season:

2023 Off-Conference Charges:

  • February 2023: Royal Sonesta San Juan – $1,154
  • July 2023: Condado Palm Inn – Four identical charges of $225 each

No explanation provided for what campaign business required Caribbean resort stays during peak tourist season.

From 2018 through 2024, James’s campaign has perfected an intricate system of deceptive reporting. Over these six years, the pattern is clear: luxury resort stays booked simultaneously at multiple venues, identical charges deliberately categorized differently, and expenses strategically fragmented across multiple filings. This calculated approach serves one purpose – to make it nearly impossible for donors to track the true cost of these tropical “business” trips.

The Airline Shell Game: A Campaign’s Flight from Transparency

The campaign’s manipulation of basic travel expenses reaches staggering levels in its airline bookings. In 2024 alone, James’s campaign burned through $9,400 on 26 separate flights while deliberately concealing destination information in every single filing. The spending was spread across five carriers in what appears to be a calculated effort to obscure travel patterns:

  • Delta Airlines: $4,440.60
  • JetBlue: $2,575.99
  • United Airlines: $1,859.56
  • American Airlines: $869.68
  • Frontier Air: $131.98

The deceptive categorization of these flights defies any innocent explanation. Campaign finance laws demand consistent classification of similar expenses, yet James’s campaign routinely splits identical airline charges into different categories, often on the same day:

2021’s Deliberate Confusion:
The campaign spent approximately $8,100 on airline travel in 2021, with charges strategically split across categories:

  • October 25, 2021: Four airline charges deliberately fragmented
    • Delta Airlines: $496.80 labeled as “Office”
    • Delta Airlines: $754.20 labeled as “Transportation”
    • JetBlue: $269.20 labeled as “Transportation”
    • JetBlue: $325.00 labeled as “Office”
  • Same carriers, same day, different categories – with no justification for the inconsistent treatment

2021’s Creative Categorization

Letitia James Campaign Spending Airlines 2021

2022’s Even More Brazen Manipulation:
James’s campaign racked up approximately $24,100 in airline charges in 2022, deploying increasingly creative categorization:

  • May 18: Delta charge of $767 filed as “Office” with explanation “Airfare”
  • May 19: Three separate $199 Delta charges suddenly categorized as “Transportation” with explanation “Travel”
  • Same airline, consecutive days, contradictory categories and explanations

Letitia James Campaign Spending Airlines 2022

2023’s Shell Game Intensifies:
With approximately $13,100 in airline charges for the year, the campaign’s arbitrary reporting continued unabated:

  • Delta and JetBlue tickets in September and November mysteriously classified as “Office” expenses for “Travel”
  • JetBlue flights in August ranging from $478 to $751 arbitrarily filed under “Transportation” with no explanation provided

Letitia James Campaign Spending Airlines Year 2023

Over just three years (2021-2023), this calculated confusion surrounds more than $45,000 in airline expenses. The pattern of contradictory classifications, missing destinations, and fragmented charges reveals a deliberate strategy to prevent anyone from tracking where James’s campaign is really flying – and why. These tactics mirror patterns seen in James’s earliest campaign filings, suggesting a long-established system designed to obscure travel spending from public scrutiny.

Private Jets: When Commercial Flights Just Won’t Do

Perhaps the most intriguing expense in James’s travel portfolio is a $12,049 payment to Venture Jets, a private charter service, in May 2022. While campaign disclosures do not specify the number of flights or hours covered by this payment, the magnitude is telling – this single charter payment exceeded the campaign’s entire travel budget for 2020 ($5,919).

The charter came amid other luxury accommodations that month:

  • San Francisco Marriott Marquis: $1,220.56 total
    • May 16: $514.60 (Category: “Lodging”, Explanation: “Conference stay”)
    • May 17: $705.96 (Category: “Office”, Explanation: “Business travel”)
  • SLS Hotel Beverly Hills: $1,991.69 total
      • March 14: $514.60 (Category: “Lodging”, Explanation: “Hotel stay”)
      • June 3: $988.05 (Category: “Transportation”, Explanation: “Conference”)
    • June 3: $489.04 (Category: “Office”, Explanation: “Conference”)

The campaign even protected these premium travel arrangements with special insurance policies:

  • Allianz Travel: $67.34 (Category: “Transportation”, Explanation: “Travel insurance”)
  • Travel Guard Group: $145.77 (Category: “Transportation”, Explanation: “Trip protection”)

These patterns reveal more than just a taste for luxury travel – they expose a sophisticated system for obscuring campaign expenditures from public scrutiny. From sanitized venue names to inconsistent expense categories for identical services, James’s campaign has developed an intricate approach to disclosure that makes it challenging for the public to track spending on luxury accommodations and travel. While New York law permits using campaign funds for official duties, the strategic categorization of expenses and timing of premium destination visits raises serious questions about transparency – particularly from an Attorney General who has built her reputation pursuing what she characterizes as financial deception by others.

Written by Sam Antar
© 2025 Sam Antar. All rights reserved.


Source: All data obtained from public campaign finance disclosure reports filed with the New York State Board of Elections

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