Hillsborough Sun

On May 11, 2023, Congressman Chris Pappas (NH-01) joined Congressman Joe Neguse (CO-02) and 20 of his colleagues in calling for leaders of the House Committee on Administration to hold a markup on legislation that would prohibit Members of Congress from trading stocks.

“There have been a variety of recommendations and discussions surrounding this issue,” wrote the lawmakers, “including numerous bipartisan and bicameral pieces of legislation introduced by the undersigned. In this Congress alone, there have been at least six different legislative proposals introduced in the House of Representatives. We believe that the best platform and venue to consider these numerous proposals would be through a full markup in your committee. It is imperative that we take action — together — to achieve consensus on legislation that would ban the trading of stocks by Members of Congress.”

“It has been clear from the public response to the aforementioned legislative proposals that the American people would like — and expect — the Congress to act,” they continued. “We must do more to restore public trust, and we believe this would be an important step in doing so.”

Background:

In January 2023, Pappas helped reintroduce the Transparent Representation Upholding Service and Trust in Congress (TRUST) Act. This legislation would require Members of Congress — as well as their spouses and dependent children — to put certain investment assets into a qualified blind trust during their entire tenure in Congress, effectively banning them from trading individual stocks.

Ahead of the start of the 118th Congress, Pappas urged House leadership to include a ban on trading stocks by members of Congress in the House rules package. A House rules change would have applied to Members of the House immediately, giving Congress time to pass a permanent law applying to both the House and the Senate.

In the 117th Congress, Pappas broke with Democratic House leadership to call for a stock trading ban to come to the floor. He cosponsored H.R. 336, the Transparent Representation Upholding Service and Trust in Congress (TRUST) Act, and H.R.1579, the Ban Conflicted Trading Act, two bipartisan bills meant to prevent members of Congress from abusing their positions and profiting from public service.

Original source can be found here.