Let's be honest here. Does anyone honestly believe she didn't use her position and influence in Congress to make them rich?
BTW... She always knocked Capitalism but now she's worth millions defends "The Free-market economy".
Paul Pelosi bought 4,000 shares of Google parent Alphabet in June, with an initial gain of $4.8 million
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi defended rules that allow members of Congress to own individual stocks, batting down concerns about lawmakers using insider information to juice their portfolios.
The liberal congresswoman from San Francisco said lawmakers should be able to own stocks because the US is a “free-market economy.”
Her comments Wednesday came amid rampant apparent violations of the STOCK Act, which is supposed to reign in lawmakers’ trades.
When asked whether the opportunity to profit on trades could create a conflict of interest, the speaker flatly said “no” to the idea of supporting a ban on trading individual stocks.
“We’re a free-market economy,” Pelosi told reporters. “They [members of Congress] should be able to participate in that.”
The speaker conceded that lawmakers needed to follow rules on public disclosure of the trades.
“If people aren’t reporting [stock trades], they should be,” she said.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi said that lawmakers should be allowed to take part in stock dealings as long as they follow the federal rules.
Lenin Nolly/Sipa USA
Still, Pelosi’s reaction was seen as flippant by some given the rash of apparent stock trade violations.
Pelosi’s most recent financial disclosure shows her husband has millions of dollars worth of holdings. That includes stock in Amazon and Apple that are each worth between $5 million and $25 million. Other assets she reported include stock options held in Google’s parent company worth between $1 million and $5 million, Comcast stock worth between $1 million and $5 million and stock in Visa worth between $5 million and $25 million.
Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, is a businessman who runs a venture capital and investment firm Financial Leasing Services Inc. Over the years he’s made countless bets on high-profile companies his wife is supposed to regulate, like Amazon, Apple and Google.
Pelosi has long said she has no involvement in or prior knowledge of her husband’s trading decisions and does not own any stock herself.
Critics slammed Nancy Pelosi’s response saying that it was flippant given the number of violations.
AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File
Speaker Nancy Pelosi defended lawmakers saying that the US is a “Free-market economy” and lawmakers should be allowed to buy stocks even though there has been a surge in STOCK Act violations.
Lenin Nolly/Sipa USA
Pelosi’s position contradicts sharply with the position of most liberals, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.
In the past month both lawmakers have slammed the idea of members of Congress trading stocks as “brazen” and “ludicrous.”
The issue of congressional stock trading has taken on new urgency since the beginning of the pandemic, when suspiciously timed stock trades by lawmakers in both parties provoked outrage and led to multiple investigations.
To date, no one has been charged in connection with stock trading investigations undertaken by the Justice Department and the Securities Exchange Commission.
But the often lucrative trades nonetheless shine a spotlight on the inadequacies of a 2012 law called the Stock Act, which bars members from using inside information to make investment decisions and requires that all stock trades be reported to Congress within 45 days.
The 2012 law was passed with bipartisan support in the wake of a stock trading scandal. Yet in the nearly 10 years since it was enacted, no one has been prosecuted under it even as many members continue to conspicuously trade.
In some recent cases, lawmakers have failed to report their trades altogether, as required by the law.
