Crooked Politicians Trading Stocks-- Solid Bipartisanship

Lois Frankel, who’ll be 75 next week, represents a safe blue district— D+14 partisan lean— in Palm Beach County/ The district starts just south of Delray Beach and follows the coast up into West Palm Beach. Although Mar-a-Lago is in the district, Trump barely managed to get 40% both times he ran. Frankel is a garden variety Democrat— not terrible, not special. Her ProgressivePunch rating is “B.” She was a member of the state House and the mayor of west Palm before winning a congressional seat in 2012.

Morris Pearl, the head of Patriotic Millionaires, told me yesterday that “Being a member of Congress is meant to be an act of public service, not an opportunity to get rich. If we want the American people to continue to trust in their government and in democracy, it is absolutely critical that they trust that their representatives and senators are legislating on behalf of their constituents, not their own financial interests. Members of Congress trading stocks is an obvious conflict of interest that diminishes trust in our democracy, and it has to end. Whether or not there really is any improper behavior going on in each individual instance, the constant appearance of impropriety is itself bad enough to make it worthwhile to ban this practice.”

This week, CNN reported that Frankel “dumped First Republic Bank stock prior to its collapse and purchased JPMorgan stock before JPMorgan purchased First Republic. This is technically illegal but because so many members of Congress do it, none of them ever get prosecuted for it. They just say, as Frankel did, that her “account is managed independently by a money manager who buys and sells stocks at his discretion.”

There have been half-assed attempts to keep slimy little members of Congress, like Frankel, from trading stocks. But both Pelosi and McCarthy have made sure that has never happened. The latest bill (the Bipartisan Restoring Faith in Government Act) was introduced this week by two Democrats, AOC and Raja Krishnamoorthi (IL), and two Republicans, Matt Gaetz (FL) and Brian Fitzpatrick (PA). If signed into law— which McCarthy will make sure never happens— it would prohibit financial investments by members of Congress, their spouses, and any dependents.

AOC: “The ability to individually trade stock erodes the public’s trust in government. When Members have access to classified information, we should not be trading in the stock market on it. It’s really that simple.” Gaetz agrees: “Members of Congress are spending their time trading futures instead of securing the future of our fellow Americans. We cannot allow the Swamp to prioritize investing in stocks over investing in our country. As long as concerns about insider trading hang over the legislative process, Congress will never regain the trust of the American people. Our responsibility in Congress is to serve the people, not hedge bets on the stock market.”