House Passes Bill Limiting Stock Trades After Lawmakers’ Families Moved Up to $664 Million
Updated
Updated · The New York Times · Aug 14
House Passes Bill Limiting Stock Trades After Lawmakers’ Families Moved Up to $664 Million
3 articles · Updated · The New York Times · Aug 14
Summary
House lawmakers last month approved a bill restricting individual stock trading by members, spouses and dependents, responding to intensifying conflict-of-interest concerns.
About a quarter of Congress has traded individual stocks this term, and members and their families collectively bought and sold an estimated $160 million to $664 million in shares since January 2025.
The measure would let lawmakers keep stocks they already own and includes exemptions for trusts and some other assets, limiting how sweeping the crackdown would be.
The 2012 STOCK Act requires periodic disclosure and says insider trading is illegal, but it does not ban individual stock trading and has been criticized as weakly enforced.
Senate prospects are uncertain after nearly all Democrats opposed the House bill when Republicans added a separate federal voter photo-ID requirement.