“Certain
Ginnie
Mae
documents
have
been
flagged
as
potentially
subject
to
the
federal
Defend
Trade
Secrets
Act,”
the
filing
reads.
“To
administer
its
programs,
Ginnie
Mae
requires
program
participants
to
submit
proprietary,
business
sensitive,
and
other
competitively
advantageous
non-public
information.”

A
portion
of
this
information
belongs
to
non-parties
described
as
direct
competitors
of
TCB,
and
Ginnie
Mae
is
consulting
with
attorneys
to
determine
if
such
information
could
qualify
as
providing
a
business
advantage.

Other
regulations
require
that
government
agencies
preserve
“government
contract
pricing
structures
and
other
details
of
competitively
bid
contracts,”
the
filing
reads.
“Some
of
the
Ginnie
Mae
documents
may
show
confidential
pricing
information,
which
may
need
to
be
designated
attorneys’
eyes
only.
Review
was
delayed
by
an
unexpected
vacancy
in
the
office
that
consults
on
compliance
with
these
regulations.”

The

OIG
inquiry
has
also
complicated
the
government’s
ability
to
comply
with
the
current
deadline,
government
attorneys
contend.

“The
Office
of
Inspector
General
is
reviewing
documents
to
determine
whether
the
law
enforcement
privilege,
confidentiality
concerns,
or
any
other
privileges
are
implicated,”
they
wrote.

And
there
are
other
concerns
about
potentially
bringing
other
non-public
information
to
light,
the
filing
asserts.

“Certain
documents
involve
Ginnie
Mae’s
responsibility
to
monitor
program
participants
for
regulatory
compliance
using
both
public
and
non-public
methods,”
the
filing
reads.
“The
law
enforcement
privilege
protects
against
the
disclosure
of
such
non-public
methods.
To
determine
whether
the
privilege
is
implicated,
reviewers
are
consulting
with
the
relevant
persons
within
Ginnie
Mae
with
knowledge
of
their
oversight
and
monitoring
techniques.”

So
far,
government
officials
have
spent
“approximately
1,000
hours”
to
review
documents
related
to
the
case,
including
“considerable
overtime,”
but
these
considerations
have
made
it
impossible
to
meet
the
existing
deadlines,
the
government
said
in
requesting
the
discovery
deadline
be
pushed
to
July
15.

As
of
Wednesday
afternoon,
the
presiding
judge
has
not
yet
responded
to
the
filing.

This
is
the
latest
development
in
the
lawsuit
between
TCB
and
Ginnie
Mae,
which
was
originally

brought
by
the
bank
in
October
2023
in
the

U.S.
District
Court
for
the
Northern
District
of
Texas.
TCB
alleges
that
the
government-owned
company
“extinguished,
in
return
for
no
consideration,
TCB’s
first
priority
lien
on
tens
of
millions
of
dollars
in
collateral”
stemming
from
the


Federal
Housing
Administration
(FHA)-sponsored
Home
Equity
Conversion
Mortgage
(HECM)
program.

While
the
government
pushed
back
on
the
majority
of
TCB’s
claims
and

sought
to
have
the
case
dismissed,
the
presiding
judge

permitted
the
bulk
of
the
case
to
proceed
while
dismissing
only
a
small
portion
of
the
claims
against
the
government.
Judge
Matthew
Kacsmaryk determined
that
the
majority
of
the
arguments
laid
out
by
TCB
against
Ginnie
Mae
have
merit
worthy
of
the
trial
process.

Following
the
judge’s
ruling,
Ginnie
Mae
soon
after

filed
a
point-by-point
response
to
the
initial
complaint
filed
by
TCB.
It
denied
the
majority
of
the
claims
against
it
and
admitted
only
to
material
facts
of
policy,
procedure
and
—
in
some
instances
—
the
standing
of
each
entity’s
participation
in
the
HECM
and

HECM-backed
Securities
(HMBS)
programs.