House Majority Leader Eric Cantor called on the Senate to “strengthen” the language of the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act, which would ban insider trading among members of Congress and federal employees, so the same rules apply to the executive branch.
“The bill does not adequately cover those connected with the federal government in the executive branch that are in positions with access and are privy to information that could be used to personally benefit those individuals, so we’re looking at ways that hopefully the Senate can work on that language, strengthen the language so that the same rules apply to executive branch personnel,” Cantor said in a press conference outside of the Capitol Tuesday.
Cantor was asked why Congress has not banned members from trading stocks. (RELATED: Full coverage of Eric Cantor)
“I’ve always been one, whatever the subject is, is to make sure the public is enjoying it’s right to know and if you’ve got to wait a year to know what your elected representatives are doing from a financial transaction standpoint, I don’t that that is a timely enough schedule for the members of the public to realize that right to know,” Cantor responded.
The most recent version of the bill would require members to report financial transactions within 30 days.