Congressional Stock Trading

It’s probably not a surprise that majorities of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents agree that Congress members should not be trading stocks:

The surprise is, after regularly recurring scandals, Congress members are still trading stocks. That may finally change this year, but so far congressional stock trading has been a cautionary tale about the limits of Congress’ ability to regulate itself on an issue of broad public concern.

The 2011 60 Minutes Expose

In 2011, a segment on the investigative news show 60 Minutes started like this:

Washington, D.C. is a town that runs on inside information—but should our elected officials be able to use that information to pad their own pockets? As Steve Kroft reports, members of Congress and their aides have regular access to powerful political intelligence, and many have made well-timed stock market trades in the very industries they regulate. 

An example was Republican Representative Spencer Bachus of Alabama, then the ranking member of the House Financial Services Committee. On September 18, 2008, he attended a closed-door briefing where the Treasury Secretary and Federal Reserve Chairman disclosed that a financial crisis was imminent. A day later, Bachus bought options that anticipated the market falling. The market subsequently did fall. Bachus then cashed out on September 23, 2008, nearly doubling his money while most other investors took losses.

The 60 Minutes segment was based on the work of author Peter Schweizer and his book Throw Them All Out. For the book, Schweizer analyzed Congress members’ stock trades during the 2008 financial crisis. He found many cases like Bachus’, across both Democrats and Republicans. Those implicated, including Bachus, claimed they were trading on publicly available information and that any insider information they may have heard was not a factor.

The 2012 STOCK Act

Following the 60 Minutes episode, a public outcry led to the 2012 STOCK (Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge) Act, a law that in retrospect did not stop much of anything. It reiterated the illegality of insider trading by Congress members, their immediate families, and senior staff. It also shortened the timeframe by which trades needed to be publicly reported, from one year to 45 days—but the penalty for late reporting was only $200.

Congress members would continue to trade, and many would regularly beat the market, an improbable result for even the best stock pickers. The reporting deadline was often ignored. And rare Congressional investigations into an individual member’s suspicious trading would end up clearing the member—as was the case with Bachus. 

The 2020 Trading Scandal

Concern returned in 2020 when several Congress members sold stock after closed-door briefings about the just-emerging COVID-19 threat. For example, Republican Senator Richard Burr of North Carolina sat on the Senate Intelligence and Health Committees. He was part of private briefings early in 2020 on the threat of COVID-19 before it had major public awareness.

The New York Times reported:

On Feb. 13, 2020, just days after the briefings occurred, Mr. Burr sold more than $1.6 million in stocks... Though Mr. Burr did not contest that he sold much of his portfolio out of concern for the spreading pandemic, he insisted that he made his trading decisions based entirely on news reports, not special briefings he received as a senator.

After multiple investigations, he was cleared of wrongdoing.

Prevalence

Were these just isolated stories in the wake of rare crises? In 2022, the New York Times analyzed all Congressional stock trades from 2019 to 2021. The analysis found that about one-third of members (or their immediate families) traded stocks. 18% of all members traded in companies related to the work of committees on which the Congress members served. For example:

Senator Tommy Tuberville, Republican of Alabama and a member of the agriculture committee, regularly reported buying and selling contracts tied to cattle prices starting last year, even as the panel, by Mr. Tuberville’s own account, had “been talking about the cattle markets.” …

In a brief interview at the Capitol recently, Mr. Tuberville said, “I don’t trade stocks, my brokers do.” He said that he did not receive nonpublic information on the agriculture committee and would never share committee information with his brokers in any case.

Nancy Pelosi

Democratic Representative, and for many years House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi of California has long held a special position in the congressional stock trading debate. She does not trade stocks herself, but her husband Paul Pelosi is an active trader. His transactions are disclosed under the STOCK Act and have consistently and massively beat the market—generating returns exceeding 700% during a period when the S&P 500 gained approximately 230%.

The Pelosi phenomenon gave rise to the Pelosi Tracker app, which allows users to track and mirror Pelosi’s and other politicians’ trades. The app has more than 100,000 users. As its developer, Chris Josephs, put it, he’s not “explicitly saying that [politicians] are insider trading, [but] there definitely are some fishy things, and it is honestly ridiculous that they allow themselves to continue to do this, because it just creates massive distrust.” 

Lessons

The main lesson of the STOCK Act is that faster disclosure requirements did not change the game, especially given the small penalties. And exemplified by Nancy Pelosi, disclosure can actually cut the other way. As Kedric Payne of the Campaign Legal Center put it:

The harm of the perceived conflicts of interests with congressional stock trading is evident in the rise of investors who copy the trades of members of Congress because they assume that members’ trades are based on inside information.…

Instead of disclosure serving as a deterrent for stock trading, disclosure incentivizes lawmakers to act as market movers who are guaranteed profits when their trades become public.

Another lesson is that enforcement is problematic. Even when there is seemingly strong evidence that a Congress member heard insider information then traded on it, proving that case is hard. The member can always claim they were acting on public knowledge, even if they were aware of insider information. As of 2025, according to the Campaign Legal Center, no member of Congress has ever been prosecuted for insider trading under the STOCK Act. 

As a result, there is growing sentiment that the best answer is the simplest: ban Congress members from trading individual stocks. (They would still be able to own index funds that track the entire market, an investment strategy that historically has outperformed individual stock-picking, even by professionals.)

Outlook

Congressional stock trading bans have been floated, and have failed to get a vote, several times. In 2021, then-Speaker Pelosi was against the concept, saying, “We are a free market economy. [Congress members] should be able to participate in that.”

But in the past year, the political winds have shifted. In December 2024, President Biden called for a ban: “Nobody in the Congress should be able to make money in the stock market while they’re in the Congress.”

In April 2025, President Trump said he’d “absolutely” sign a congressional stock trading ban. A few weeks later, House Speaker Mike Johnson (Republican from Louisiana) followed with his endorsement of the concept. House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries had previously stated his support for the concept. As well, Nancy Pelosi changed her perspective and is on board.

Multiple different bills in both chambers of Congress are active, and there’s a sense of momentum to the issue. The bills will likely need to be consolidated in each chamber, then reconciled as a whole. Notably, this activity is happening without the trigger of a major scandal— suggesting it may not fade with the changing news cycle. As a result, the current Congress (which extends from 2025 to 2026) may be the one that puts itself out of the stock trading game.