House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said Sunday that congressional lawmakers will take up a measure intended to ban insider trading by members of Congress.
In an interview with 60 Minutes’ Lesley Stahl, Mr. Eric Cantor said House Republicans would move forward with a bill banning congressional insider trading early next year. The Virginia Republican said House lawmakers would consider a vote on the measure following the holiday recess.
“We wanna make sure that the public understands we abhor that kind of conduct,” said Mr. Cantor. “We’re gonna build on the STOCK Act and bring forward a measure that actually deals with all of it so we can take care of any suggestion that a member of Congress somehow uses his or her official position to affect their own personal enrichment.
Mr. Cantor’s pledge comes just one month after the same program reported that a number of members of Congress had sought to maximize returns, in part, through the use of confidential information gained from their time on Capitol Hill. A number of members of Congress alleged to have partaken in the activity have denied using access to confidential information when investing in companies.
Speaking Sunday, Mr. Cantor said the measure would seek to ban all using confidential information in all forms of investments, including land and leasing deals and publicly traded stocks.
“I think that you can look at examples across the country, of any various levels of government, where unfortunately there are some bad actors, and they’ve engaged in taking and seizing upon information they have — and acting on it,” said Mr. Cantor. “And that means whether they’re buying stock or whether they are buying land, allegedly, on inside information that they feel they can profit from that [when] no one else can.”
