(The Intercept)
SEN. JEFF MERKLEY WANTS TO STOP CONGRESS MEMBERS FROM INSIDER TRADING BY BANNING THEM FROM OWNING STOCKS
SEN. JAMES INHOFE, an Oklahoma Republican recently elevated to chair the Senate Armed Services Committee after the death of John McCain, was implicated recently in what looked to be an insider trading scandal. A few days after meeting with President Donald Trump and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis to successfully advocate for a military budget increase, Inhofe purchased between $50,000 and $100,000 of stock in defense contractor Raytheon, which stands to profit from additional defense spending.
Inhofe tried to manage the controversy by claiming that a third-party financial adviser handles his stocks and made the purchase without his knowledge. Minutes after being questioned about the trades, he wrote a letter to his adviser, asking him to no longer trade defense or aerospace stocks. Inhofe has even taken to carrying around a card with a stock reply to journalists about the matter.
But the Raytheon trades represent only a fraction of his trading activity. The same day that Inhofe revealed the Raytheon purchase, he also disclosed the sale of between $15,000 and $50,000 worth of stock from Celgene, a biotech firm, along with a similarly sized sale of stock in Aptiv, the auto parts maker formerly known as Delphi. A month earlier, Inhofe revealed trades in General Electric, Salesforce.com, American International Group, XPO Logistics, Albemarle, Intuitive Surgical, and Intellia Therapeutics. Read more