Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act

Floor Speech

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Mrs. GILLIBRAND. I thank my colleague from Massachusetts for his strong advocacy on such an important issue. I would like to recognize Chairman Lieberman and Ranking Member Collins for their leadership and advocacy and their work on getting this out of the committee so quickly.

I urge my colleagues to vote yes on cloture tonight on this bipartisan bill to ensure clearly and unambiguously that all Members of Congress, their staffs, and Federal employees play by the exact same rules as all the American people. The American people deserve the right to know their lawmaker's only interest is what is best for the country, not their own financial interests. Members of Congress and their families and staff should not be able to gain personal profit from information to which they have access that everyday middle-class Americans do not. It is simply not right. Nobody should be above the rules. I introduced a bipartisan bill in the Senate with 28 of our colleagues from both sides of the aisle to close this loophole.
The STOCK Act legislation is very similar to the legislation introduced by my friends in the House of Representatives, Congresswoman Louise Slaughter and Congressman Tim Walz. I thank them for their longstanding advocacy and dedication to this important cause. I again thank Chairman Lieberman, Ranking Member Collins, and all the committee members for their work in acting swiftly to move this bipartisan, commonsense bill to the floor for a vote. I also thank Leader Reid for his leadership in moving this body forward to this important debate and an up-or-down vote that the American people deserve.

Our bill, which has received the support of at least seven good-government groups, covers two important principles:

First, Members of Congress, their families, and their staff should be barred from buying or selling securities on the basis of knowledge gained through their congressional service or from using the knowledge to tip off anyone else. The SEC and the CFTC must be empowered to investigate these cases. To provide additional teeth, such acts should also be in violation of Congress's own rules, to make it clear that the activity is inappropriate.

Second, Members should be required to disclose transactions within 30 days, to make this information available online for their constituents to see, providing dramatically improved oversight and accountability from the current annual hard copy reporting.

I am pleased that the final product that passed with bipartisan support out of the committee is a strong bill with teeth and includes measures such as ensuring that Members of Congress cannot tip off others with nonpublic information gained through their duties and ensuring that trading with this information would be a violation of Congress's own ethics rules.

Some critics have said this bill is unnecessary and is already covered under current statutes. I have spoken with experts tasked in the past with investigations of this nature, and they strongly disagree. We must make it unambiguous that this kind of behavior is illegal.

My home State newspaper, the Buffalo News, noted:

..... the STOCK Act would ensure that it is the people's business being attended to.

President Obama said in his State of the Union--send him the bill and he will sign it right away.

We should not delay. It is time to act. I urge my colleagues to vote yes tonight for cloture so we can pass this bill without delay. Let's take this step to begin rebuilding the trust necessary in Congress.

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