> But once the news cycle was over it was quietly, rapidly, and largely repealed:
The substance of that article only says that the online public disclosure requirements were narrowed from encompassing all Federal and Congressional employees to only elected officials and key appointees. If you read the Whitehouse signing statement (https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2013/0...) linked by the article, this is more clear. Employees' disclosures were taken offline out of privacy concerns, apparently. The article is somewhat ambiguous on this point, and hints at more significant changes, but I take it as rhetoric, otherwise it would have been relatively easy to be crystal clear on these points. (Shame on the reporter, but at least such unquestioned political cynicism is non-partisan.)
Perhaps there have been subsequent amendments as well. Nonetheless, according to this April 2020 research paper, https://www.nber.org/papers/w26975, Senators have underperformed the market since 2012.
EDIT: And most obvious, if trading disclosures of elected officials weren't still available online, then websites like https://senatestockwatcher.com/ wouldn't exist.
This is a common tactic in the Senate to subvert legislative direction. Ossoff's bill is superior in that it prevents children from also trading (see Sen. Manchin's shady dealings).
If a bill can only pass because it's toothless, then what's the point? Just because it passes doesn't make it better. That's some serious stretching of logic you're attempting.
"Hawley's bill would have the Government Accountability Office provide oversight, whereas Ossoff would leave that to congressional ethics committees."
Congressional ethics committees are notoriously partisan and unreliable in enforcing. You are trusting Congress members to police themselves, which isn't remotely reliable. In reality, they only police members of the opposing party. The GAO would be far superior.
> in that it prevents children from also trading (see Sen. Manchin's shady dealings).
Were Manchin's adult children "dependents"? How is that defined in the bill? Also, it's been interesting to see negative attention on Manchin suddenly get ratcheted up the minute he wouldn't vote in a manner popular with people who don't live in his state.
> This is a common tactic in the Senate to subvert legislative direction.
The assumption that the purpose of this specific instance is to "subvert" is speculative. I'm no fan of Hawley, but he has been very public about wanting to ban stock trades by members as much as Ossoff.
I tire of the red/blue tribal loyalties on this site. I see two corrupt tribes, filled with people who won't vote for this bill. But both, and their foolishly gullible supporters, just sit and point at the misdeeds of the opposing side, unaware of their information bubbles.
The superior bill is the one that gets passed. This is something democrats badly need to learn wrt Manchin.
Until then we're just giving completely, utterly pointless kudos to whoever can play chicken most convincingly. I'm sure Hawley's office could have come up with something with even slightly more teeth if Ossoff came to him first with a GAO bill.
Insider trading is illegal. Children (adult or otherwise) of individuals in possession of material non-public information about a company are not allowed to trade stocks based on that information.
The way I see it, congressional trading rules are a natural extension of insider trading rules. Children/spouses should be prevented from trading not because they are children/spouses, but if/because they’ve been made aware of inside information.
What part of the constitution would prevent such rules from being implemented?
If that's the case why is a new law needed in the first place? The adult children are independent of their parents and can be prosecuted under current law.
For the same reason a new law is required for elected officials. If an elected official is currently exempt from insider trading rules, and if the rationale is that the official doesn't actually hold "inside" information, and if it's necessary to change that, then it follows that the "tipping" clause must also be updated.
This could also depend on how a new law is written. If the law is explicit that information gained as an elected official is material/non-public, then existing tipping clauses may already account for this.
However, if this is not explicitly accounted for, it becomes an easily exploited loophole.
I'm still curious though - why is this potentially a constitutional issue?
> Ossoff's bill also would apply the ban to any *dependent children* in addition to the spouses of lawmakers, whereas Hawley's bill would not.
I mean this sort of makes sense. In order for an adult child to be a dependent they have to be pretty much invalid, and not responsible for their own actions.
I can see that working as a part of a private contract, I'm just not sure it's constitutional for the government to prevent one person from doing something based on their relationship to another person. Especially spouses, but perhaps even children.
So as a government official with appointment authority, should I be allowed to hire my wife to work for my agency in a role they may or may not be qualified for?
It’s pretty easy to see how this stuff goes off the rails.
I think that's different. This isn't about appointing someone to a job, it's about preventing one person from trade with another strictly because of their marriage.
It’s been tested in court. Employment isn’t a right.
When I was subject to public officers law, my kids were unable to play the lottery, engage in any sales or lobbying activity without written permission from agency counsel.
I know of one case where a senior leader was referred for civil penalty (fine up to $20k) because he took a meeting with a prospective contractor that his kid worked for.
There’s other areas like this as well. The actions of a spouse or child can affect a security clearance or be disqualification for employment as a police officer.
If you read the link, it specifically says dependent children, which seems fair. I don't see how how the constitution protects your stock trading rights if you are likely to be privy to insider information.
If you work in the financial industry, there are already draconian rules on oversight for all trades made by you, your spouse, your dependents, and even roommates. Why shouldn't this oversight extend to members of congress?
I'm not qualified to say if it's constitutional, but it would seem that it's widely accepted as constitutional if existing insider trading law applies to similar situations.
Can you explain the reasoning more? And why making laws for Congress would raise a novel issue?
College students who are paid for by their parents can also be claimed as dependents on tax returns. I have no idea whether that is the criteria in Hawley’s bill, but it would be reasonable. If you want to trade stocks, don’t take senator dad’s money.
Even better, there's zero accountability for himself or any of the 50 republican senators who passed on cosigning Ossoff's bill when this also goes nowhere. It's nice not being in power!
Even better, there's zero accountability for himself or any of the 50 democratic senators who passed on cosigning Hawley's bill when this also goes nowhere.
The senate is 50/50, this logic works both ways. Either party could vote for the other’s bill tomorrow and be done with it. I’d prefer the Dems work with Hawley to pass the better bill.
>If Senator X "makes a concession" the relevant media will proclaim him a loser and a coward, they don't want representatives, they want cage fighters. There's no reward for compromise and there's no safe place to attempt it, either.
>[...]
>Or, said differently, if there was a government shut down at a time when the news came out only weekly, it would mean we were getting a new flag.
Hot take but I'd much rather politicians make their money via open, fully-disclosed investments in public companies vs shady backroom deals where their kids or shell companies get untracked kickbacks.
Pelosi represents SF. It's her congressional district. Her investing in the top SF companies (many of which include tech companies which have performed really well) is a rare case of supporting her constituent businesses. Sure it's horrible optics and politics and yada yada but people should consider that the alternative (banning all trading as a member of congress) is potentially worse for open democracy.
> Sure it's horrible optics and politics and yada yada but people should consider that the alternative (banning all trading as a member of congress) is potentially worse for open democracy.
"Murder is OK as long as it's committed in the town square" is a terrible policy. Lawmakers taking advantage of insider info, let alone upcoming regulatory changes, to make huge amounts of money while holding public office is straight-up antithetical to the purpose of being in Congress (the people). Want to make tons of money? Great, become a banker or a C-level or a lawyer in private practice, not a congresswoman.
That’s a genuinely hot take, and I do think there’s some merit.
That said: I think your hypothetical is better than our current, objectively ridiculous situation. “Everyone’s doing it in the open” is a pretty lame excuse, and definitely doesn’t preclude the possibility of kids + shell companies anyway.
The talk was of a bill to bring congressional trading in line with executive trading (I.e. totally transparent with 6-12 irreversible lead times on any trades). I don’t know that anyone was pushing for an outright ban.
10b5 plans can be cancelled, with the penalty of a short waiting period before re-adopting a new 10b5 plan. (It’s obviously difficult to prove an improper insider trade happened if no trade happened.)
I think they’re just pointing out that there could be unintended consequences to just simply barring Congress members from trading - maybe it just increases incentives for back room deals and the like? Transparency in this case is a much higher bar than just banning stock trades
I'd rather they instead be given a binary choice between not making investments or making investments in the general good of the American economy (eg something like the Wilshire 5000) ... And while we're at it lets tie their pay to the median income so they only get a raise if we do.
What do you mean "horrible optics"? It's outright corrupt. The issue here isn't "Nancy Pelosi supporting local businesses". The issue is her husband acting on private information to reap enormous profits.
Before I start, I lean Dem and I like Nancy. However ...
she has famously said that "you have to pass the bill before you see it" - not an hyperbole, the obamacare bill was being negotiated forever and changing but at one point of time they had to force the vote first even if the version was not read by everyone.
that kind of story applies to a lot of bills. I may be able to sneak in a paragraph just before the vote that says "3 billion dollars of government subsidies for drought stricken cashew farmers in California" and if someone can find that out before it is published on their websites, would you not think it is a private information?
We do have to credit Nancy for bringing so much attention to this issue through her flagrant actions. Probably not intentional, but credit where credit is due.
I'd guess there are other members of congress who did/do exactly the same thing (but much more low key and out of sight) who are not very happy about it being potentially ruined for everyone else.
What does this mean? Other reps do exactly the same thing as Pelosi and are required to report their trades in the same way. Pelosi is the target of attention due to reporting about exclusively Pelosi's actions
Don’t you think that they are getting a lot of information before you get it or can influence certain decisions in their favor?
In my view they need to out their money into a blind trust. If they don’t want to do that they shouldn’t run for office and a nice side effect would be that congress isn’t full of millionaires.
I agree that they should have more simple investment limits. Like index fund or whatever.
But even your first sentence is some hypothesis, not based on any facts or timeline of events. Looks like her husband who has his own investment firm was writing some clever option contracts and such on big name companies like Roblox.
Everybody in the market is risking it on these types of companies these days.
What bills will be brought to the floor. What bills have the votes to pass. What bills do not. Access to confidential information which has not been released to the public. Etc. etc.
I'm honestly not sure what you want me to say. You're welcome to Google the issue for yourself and make a determination.
> I'm just saying if you levy a huge accusation like "she gets private insider information" then you need to back it up with factual evidence.
Nancy Pelosi's husband regularly beats the market by large margins. You can find it suspicious or not. I've given my opinion. She knows her own mind, she has access to market-moving-information prior to the public, and she likes to buy stock.
She doesn't need to receive information (though she can). She just needs to generate it (which is her job). When you are in a position to move the market, you should not be buying options.
Government ethics are all about optics. Pelosi’s personal situation when looked at among others (ie Sen Feinstein, whose husband is one of the largest commercial realty managers) creates a perception of corruption.
That perception fuels whataboutism and facilitates graft. Nobody is going to investigate Senator X and trigger a counter-investigation of Representative Y.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/congress-trading-stock-on-insid...
Due to the traction the story got, it led to the Stock Act.
But once the news cycle was over it was quietly, rapidly, and largely repealed:
https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2013/04/16/17749...
And here we are a decade later “shocked” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjbPi00k_ME