Stock trading ban DIES as Republican ‘poison pill’ with Trump loophole crashes and burns
The US Senate failed to advance a ban on stock trading in the US Congress, meaning that it will not be sent to President Donald Trump’s desk.
By a vote of 53-47, the US Senate failed to approve the Stop Insider Trading Act, which was passed by the US House of Representatives – where 13 Democrats defected in the lower chamber to back the Republican bill.
The bill, sponsored in the Senate by Nebraska Republican Pete Ricketts, also includes voter identification requirements that some Democrats branded a ‘poison pill.’ Still, Ricketts urged his colleagues to vote for the legislation calling it ‘commonsense’ in a post on X Wednesday morning.
The voter ID requirements were a ride-along attached as part of the greater Save America Act – an election reform bill passed three times by the House – which also included a citizenship requirement for voter registration.
Some Republicans, who backed the bill, told the Daily Mail on Tuesday ahead of Wednesday’s vote that the stock trading ban legislation did not go far enough, and that the vote would come too late to make a difference.
Missouri Republican Josh Hawley, who was the sponsor of another stock trade bill called the Honest Act, noted that, ‘something I have learned in this job is you gotta be willing to take incremental steps, and this doesn’t go nearly as far as I would like, but it is at least something.’
Hawley said he would back the current bill ‘in a heartbeat.’
‘I would like to go much further, but you know, this I believe has passed the House, so I will happily vote for it,’ Hawley shared, before adding, ‘and it’s got voter ID, which I really support.’
Missouri Republican Josh Hawley told the Daily Mail that he supported the stock trade ban bill which was voted on Wednesday, but said it ‘doesn’t go nearly as far’ as he would like
West Virginia Republican Jim Justice told the Daily Mail that voters are smart, and would see a last minute vote on a stock trade ban as ‘too little, too late’
Jim Justice, a West Virginia Republican, told the Daily Mail on Tuesday that he supports the ban, being ‘100 percent behind it and everything because we ought not be doing that. You know, period.’
Probed further by the Daily Mail on the timing of the vote coming in the Senate’s final working days before the November midterms, Justice noted, ‘I don’t think it’s going to change the outcome of the midterms. It’s my feeling.’
‘As far as trading stocks, I think if we get it done, the American people are pretty smart. The first thing they’re going to say is, ‘Why didn’t you do it before?’, Justice added.
‘I think they’d say, “he did it right before the election and could reverse it right after.” I think that’s too little, too late,’ Justice concluded.
Bernie Sanders, the Vermont Independent and former Democratic presidential candidate told the Daily Mail that although stock trading is ‘a concern too,’ that ‘the corruption here in Congress is that we have billionaire-funded SuperPACs that are are going to spend hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars to buy the election.’
The fact that the measure even got a vote after weeks of delays by the Senate was heralded on Tuesday evening by House Republican Anna Paulina Luna, who noted on X, ‘would you look at that! John Thune is set to place our bill for Banning Insider Trading plus Voter ID on the floor of the Senate! Vote will be soon!’
Luna was commenting on a video of Republican Senate Majority Leader John Thune announcing the vote on the bill, which he touted as ‘something that’s broadly supported by the American people,’ and something that had ‘big support coming out of the House of Representatives.’
Discussions about banning lawmakers from trading stocks have permeated capitol hill throughout the 119th Congress in the last two years.
Current regulations permit lawmakers to trade stocks and disclose their trades to the public only after they are made.
Nancy Pelosi, the California Democrat who formerly served as the Speaker of the House and is not seeking re-election this year after decades in Washington came to be known as one of the most prolific stock traders on Capitol Hill.
Pelosi and her husband Paul, a venture capitalist, have seen their net worth ballon over her 37-year congressional career. Analyses of her mandatory disclosure filings reveal that when she entered Congress in 1987, the couple’s stock portfolio was valued between $610,000 and $785,000.
Back in February of this year, Trump demanded bipartisan support to pass a law that would disqualify lawmakers, along with their spouses and dependent children, from purchasing individual stocks.
At a White House Press conference that month, Trump jabbed at his longtime political enemy stating, ‘Did Nancy Pelosi stand up? Doubt it.’
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson could be seen chuckling as Trump grinned and mocked Pelosi at the time.
Pelosi has long faced insider trading allegations over the success of her stock portfolio. Critics allege she has used sensitive information obtained through her position as a powerful lawmaker to benefit herself and her family financially.
Pelosi and her husband Paul, a venture capitalist, have seen their net worth ballon over her 37-year congressional career. Analyses of her mandatory disclosure filings reveal that when she entered Congress in 1987, the couple’s stock portfolio was valued between $610,000 and $785,000.
Since then, their holdings have skyrocketed to a valuation of over, $30.6 million and total family net worth between estimated at $278 million to $280 million, for a total a gain of over 16,930 percent per Yahoo Finance.
Hawley’s stock trading bill was first called the PELOSI Act, before being renamed the HONEST Act.
