House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is the "ultimate stock insider," and the profits her husband, Paul Pelosi, makes through his stock transactions taking place just before legislation comes up in the House must stop, Rep. James Comer said on Newsmax on Tuesday.
"It doesn't hurt that his wife's the Speaker of the House, and that would make her the ultimate stock insider," the Kentucky Republican commented on Newsmax's "Wake Up America." "She knows exactly which direction major legislation is going to go, and this isn't the first time Mr. Pelosi's had a major stock transaction at a questionable time."
The speaker's husband is not just trading on stock drops, said Comer, but "he's also trading stock options, and stock options are very risky. They expire. You purchase stock options to make a profit on stock options. That stock has to move pretty significantly in a very short time period, so the people that make stock options often have a little bit of insider knowledge."
Paul Pelosi last week bought 20,000 shares of Nvidia computer-chip stock on June 17 that was worth between $1 million and $5 million, with the purchase coming in just a few weeks before the House's vote Tuesday on a bill that will deliver billions in subsidies to the chip industry, according to Pelosi's House financial disclosures obtained by The Daily Caller.
The bill will fund $52 billion toward boosting U.S. semiconductor manufacturing while giving tax credits for production.
"Insider trading is very illegal, not just for members of Congress, but for people that are inside the corporation," said Comer. "There have been a lot of stories written about individual members of Congress buying 100 shares here and 100 shares here for $5,000 or $6000, but we're talking about $5 million-plus trades … this is a regular occurrence by Pelosi and it needs to stop and it needs to stop now."
Comer added that if Republicans take the House this fall, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy has said that as speaker, he will block stock trading by members of Congress, "and I believe he includes their immediate family members."
"A lot of the problems we have in Washington right now with conflicts of interest involve immediate family members, whether it's Nancy Pelosi's husband or [President] Joe Biden's brother or son," said Comer. "Immediate family members are certainly part of the family, and they need to be included in the major ethics reform packages that Republicans will bring to the American people in January when we retake the House."
Pelosi's office has issued a statement denying knowledge of her husband's trade and saying she does not own stocks, according to the financial disclosures coming from her office, but Comer said he questions that.
"The speaker may be telling the truth about her husband but does he have contact with her staff?" he said. "Does he have contact with her legislative director? Because these are the ones that will know whether or not that legislation is going to pass the House."
But still, it's "very concerning" that Paul Pelosi is making "questionable stock trades of that scale before major legislation passed," said Comer. "This isn't the first time that he's done that. Remember when Congress was talking about regulating big tech? He made some big stock option purchases on Facebook at that time, and of course, Congress didn't do anything about big tech, and I believe that his bet with stock options was that nothing would happen."
The speaker's husband doesn't only need to be investigated by Congress, Comer added, but also "by the authorities that regulate stock trade, the SEC [Securities and Exchange Commission] and other federal agencies."
About NEWSMAX TV:
NEWSMAX is the fastest-growing cable news channel in America!
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
© 2024 Newsmax. All rights reserved.