试图禁止国会议员个人持股的民主党人表示，在众议院议长南希·佩洛西(Nancy Pelosi)来之不易的支持下，他们终于有足够的支持来推动一项法案。

禁令冲突交易民主党人在周四的新闻发布会上说，这将恢复公众对国会议员的信任70%的选民支持一项决议，为可能将自身利益置于公众利益之上的立法者和高层人员遏制股票交易。

这项立法在本周获得了支持佩洛西经过几个月的抵制，加州民主党周三宣布支持这项措施。

“当我们陷入困境，甚至有能力单独交易股票时，就会侵蚀公众对政府的信任。纽约民主党众议员亚历山大·奥卡西奥-科尔特斯(Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez)周四在虚拟电话会议上表示:“现在，无论是媒体、政府还是任何类型的机构，我们都面临着公众对许多对社会福祉至关重要的机构的信任危机。”。俄亥俄州的谢罗德·布朗和伊利诺伊州的拉贾·克里希纳摩尔提代表。和乔·内格斯

奥卡西奥-科尔特斯说:“当我们获得机密信息时，我们不应该在这些信息上进行交易，无论是有意还是无意，我们都不应该看起来甚至真的提前了这些信息的出现。

佩洛西在一月份似乎仍然抵制这项禁令，尽管她已经放松了一个月前采取的强硬手段。

“我们是自由市场经济，”佩洛西在12月告诉记者。

但参议院多数党领袖查克·舒默(Chuck Schumer)支持禁止国会议员交易个股的想法。

奥卡西奥-科尔特斯说:“我认为，议长在这一立场上的开放态度确实证明了这样一个事实，即公众的关注和压力可以将公共政策从底层一路推向高层，我赞扬议长的开放态度，以及她愿意听取核心小组对这一问题的意见。

包括众议员在内的14名国会议员在众议院提出了这项法案马特·盖兹佛罗里达州和德克萨斯州的迈克尔·克劳德。

但并非所有国会议员都支持这项禁令。

弗吉尼亚州民主党众议员伊莱恩·卢里亚(Elaine Luria)在周三出版的《新闻周刊》采访中进行了反驳。

“为什么你会认为国会议员天生就是坏人或腐败分子?”她问道。

参议院少数党领袖米奇·麦康奈尔(Mitch McConnell)周二表示，他没有“认真考虑”此事，因为他的资产是共同基金，而不是股票。

他说:“我建议会员这样做，因为我认为这样可以防止有人认为你从事内幕交易。

立法支持者之一、参议员杰夫·默克莱(Jeff Merkley)说，禁止国会议员之间股票交易的努力已经持续了11年多。这位议员最近与参议员伊丽莎白·沃伦一起在参议院提出了一项类似的法案。

“这是我们需要得到它的时刻。我们不需要仅仅讨论它，”他周四说，并补充道，“我们正在建立实现这一目标的势头。”

国会在2012年颁布了《国会知识停止交易法案》，要求成员披露他们的股票所有权和利率。然而，他们经常发现该法律的漏洞，引发了一系列公开交易丑闻，克里希纳摩尔蒂说，他称该立法在解决内幕交易问题方面“完全不足”。

“54名国会议员违反了《股票法案》，没有披露他们的交易，但对于数百名真正遵守《股票法案》并披露交易的人来说，他们制造了内幕交易的假象，”克里希纳摩尔蒂说，他指的是商业内幕今年早些时候出版。

2017年，前众议员白梓轩被揭露后。，在深入参与医疗保健政策的同时，交易了超过30万美元的医疗公司股票，这是出了名的，收紧交易程序的压力增加了。

共和党参议员理查德·伯尔(Richard Burr)于2020年辞去了备受瞩目的参议院情报委员会主席一职，而司法部正在调查他在疫情黎明时进行的股票交易，包括在酒店业进行的数万美元的交易。

20世纪80年代也出现了严重的利益冲突问题新冠肺炎·疫情当时国会议员因购买疫苗公司的股票而受到审查。

Krishnamoorthi说:“基本上，人们会假设，当这些成员说，从一个COVID听证会出来，开始购买辉瑞的股票时，他们在某种程度上知道了一些关于COVID的事情，当时他们购买了该国其他人不知道的辉瑞股票。

汤姆·布伦纳/路透社

众议院议长南希·佩洛西在西部国会山的每周新闻发布会上发言...

参议员乔恩·奥索夫。，继续说道星期四疫情期间的股票交易在全国范围内加剧了这一问题。

奥索夫说:“围绕着成员们收到的机密简报，新冠肺炎疫情会议期间备受瞩目的股票交易丑闻让公众意识到了这个问题。

民主党人表示，他们希望在未来几个月内将该法案提交议会表决，并有辩论和修正的空间，包括一项禁止国会议员配偶进行个人交易的条款。

Pelosi's support of bill banning congressional stock trading clears path forward

Democrats trying to ban individual stock ownership among members of Congress say they finally have enough support to push forward a bill following its hard-won backing by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The Ban Conflicted Trading Act, Democrats said during a Thursday press call, will restore public trust in members of Congress at a time when over70% of voterssupport a resolution to curb stock trading for lawmakers and top staff who might put their own interests above the public's.

The legislation gained traction this week afterPelosi, D-Calif., on Wednesday announced her support for the measure following months of resistance.

"When we get caught up and even have the ability to individually trade stock, it erodes public trust in government. And right now, whether it is media, government, or any sort of institution, we are having a crisis of public faith in many institutions that are very critical to the well-being of society," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said Thursday on the virtual call, joined also by Sens. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., and Joe Neguse, D-Colo.

"When we have access to classified information, we should not be trading on that information, whether it's consciously or unconsciously, we shouldn't appear to even really advance the appearance of that," Ocasio-Cortez said.

Pelosi in January still seemed resistant to the ban, though she had relaxed the hard-line approach she took a month earlier.

"We're a free-market economy," Pelosi told reporters in December.

But Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has backed the idea of banning members of Congress from trading individual stocks.

"I think that the speaker's openness on this position is really a testament to the fact that public attention and pressure can move public policy from the bottom all the way to the top, and I applaud the speaker's openness and her willingness to listen to the caucus on this issue," Ocasio-Cortez said.

Fourteen members of Congress introduced the act in the House, including Reps.Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., and Michael Cloud, R-Texas.

But not all members of Congress support the ban.

Rep. Elaine Luria, D-Va., pushed back in an interview with Punchbowl News that was published on Wednesday.

"Why would you assume that members of Congress are going to be inherently bad or corrupt?" she asked.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said on Tuesday he hadn't given the matter "serious thought" because his assets are in mutual funds, not stocks.

"That's what I advise members to do because I think it prevents such suggestions that you are engaged in insider trading," he said.

Efforts to ban stock trading among members of Congress have been going on for over 11 years, said one of the legislation's champions, Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore. The lawmaker recently introduced a similar bill in the Senate along with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.

"This is the moment we need to get it. We don't need to just discuss it," he said Thursday, adding, "And we're building the momentum to make that happen."

Congress enacted the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act in 2012, requiring members to disclose their stock ownerships and rates. They often find loopholes to that law, however, triggering a number of public trading scandals, said Krishnamoorthi, who called the legislation "wholly inadequate" in addressing problems of insider trading.

"Fifty-four members of Congress violated the Stock Act in terms of not disclosing their trades, but for the hundreds who actually abided by the Stock Act and disclosed their trades, they created the appearance of insider trading," Krishnamoorthi said, referring to an analysis byBusiness Insiderpublished earlier this year.

In 2017, after it was revealed that former Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., famously traded more than $300,000 of shares in medical companies while deeply involved in health care policy, pressure to tighten trading procedures increased.

Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., in 2020 stepped down as chair of the high-profile Senate Intelligence Committee while the Justice Department investigated stock trades he made at the dawn of the pandemic, including tens of thousands of dollars in trades made in the hospitality industry.

Serious questions of conflicts of interest also arose during theCOVID-19 pandemicwhen members of Congress came under scrutiny for purchasing stock in vaccine companies.

"Basically, people assume that when these members say, come out of a COVID hearing and start to buy Pfizer stock, that somehow they knew something about COVID when they bought the Pfizer stock that the rest of the country does not know," Krishnamoorthi said.

Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., said onThursdaythat stock trading during the pandemic heightened the issue on the national stage.

"​​The high-profile scandals of stock trading during the COVID-19 pandemic, around confidential briefings that members were receiving, brought this issue to public consciousness," Ossoff said.

Democrats say they're hoping to get the bill to the floor for a vote in the coming months, with room for debate and amendments, including a clause that would also bar the spouses of members of Congress from individual trading.