The MeidasTouch Podcast
Senator Mark Kelly on Introducing Bill to Ban Congressional Stock Trading
Fri, 23 May 2025
MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on MAGA Mike showing sympathy with MAGA Congress Members who engage inside stock trading and Meiselas interviews Democratic Senator Mark Kelly who introduces legislation today to stop insider stock trading by Congress. Visit https://meidasplus.com for more! Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is the issue with congressional stock trading?
You know, the market volatility we're seeing right now is not normal. In my view, the economy of the United States of America should not look like a Trump meme stock. And we know with Trump meme stocks that there are a group of insiders who are usually the ones benefiting. I mean, I think it's 22 of the crypto wallets made money on the Trump meme stuff while I
like 50,000 people ended up losing money. So when I see this in our markets, it really pisses me off. And then layer on top of that, all the unusual trading patterns around when Trump announces tariffs, when he takes off the tariffs, you see all of this
know activity that at least resembles insider trading and then it pisses me off to no end when you see that members of congress are involved in trading these stocks and making huge amounts of money off it and doing weird trades that would never otherwise exist unless you had some knowledge about what the heck was taking place and we showed the photo there of marjorie taylor green a rapacious stock trader all of a sudden but look let's be clear it's a bipartisan issue in my view
I think that public servants should be public servants. And so even though MAGA Mike Johnson has, you know, he's claimed to some extent that he's against stock trading by members of Congress, I guess, but who knows what the hell he says is true or not.
Chapter 2: How does insider trading affect the economy?
But then he gave this weird press conference also where he said, well, I don't like this stock trading, but I have sympathy. I get it. Members of Congress, they're not making enough money. They need this. They need stock trading. I get it. Here's what he said. Let's play it.
Well, look, you know, the salary of Congress has been frozen since 2009. You know, when you adjust for inflation, a member of Congress today is making 31% less than they made in that year. It goes down every year. And over time, if you stay on this trajectory, you're going to have less qualified people who are willing to make the extreme sacrifice to run for Congress.
Chapter 3: What are the challenges with Congress salaries?
I mean, people just make a reasonable decision as a family on whether or not they can come and move to Washington, have a residence here, a residence at home, and do all the things that are required. So the counterargument is, and I have some sympathy, look, at least let them engage in some stock trading so that they can continue to take care of their family.
Let's bring in Senator Mark Kelly from Arizona, who today, along with Senator Ossoff, introduced the Ban Congressional Stock Trading Act as well. Tell us about everything.
Well, Ben, let me let me start off by saying I have zero sympathy. Zero. I mean, Mike Johnson, a speaker of the House, he can work to raise the salary of members of Congress. These things are totally unconnected. When you're in this job, you get enormous access to information. I sit on the Armed Services and the Intelligence Committee.
There are people on the Ag Committee that know what's going on with crops and cattle and could use that information to trade futures. I do believe there is somebody that sits on the Senate Ag Committee. I'm not going to name names here, but does actually trade future contracts. for agricultural products. So with this access to information,
I imagine there is a temptation by members of Congress to use this information to gain, to just build their wealth. And that is not right. That's not information that the general public has. I get the issue that Mike Johnson has with the salaries of members of Congress. He is the speaker of the fricking House of Representatives. And he could do something about that.
And I think there should be something done. Folks that have been here for a long time because of inflation, you know, their buying power has been reduced. I'm sympathetic to that argument. So Ossoff and I, Senator Ossoff and I reintroduced our legislation to basically compel the rest of Congress to do what the two of us do.
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Chapter 4: Why is Senator Mark Kelly against stock trading for Congress?
And that's putting your assets into a blind trust where you don't have the ability to use any of the information you have to make money because of your job. We're supposed to be public servants here. And Senator Ossoff and I take this very seriously. You can also diversify. And, you know, so there's another option there, too.
But we want this to be the rule for all 535 members of Congress in the Senate. As far as I know, it's just the two of us. that have taken these steps in the House. I'm not sure how many people. But this needs to happen. And there is bipartisan support for this.
Chapter 5: What is the Ban Congressional Stock Trading Act?
You know, we see what's going on with the House, though, and the budget. And we see what's going on, you know, with some of your colleagues in the in the Senate. You know, the focus seems to be, I don't know, cruelty seems to be the point with, you know, with this budget. And I guess enriching the billionaires.
And I think the second part is really the point, I think. It's the enriching the billionaires. It's making sure that they don't have to pay more taxes if we got if if Donald Trump's 2017 tax cuts went away. And these are the guys that are supposed to be, you know, the fiscal conservatives.
They're going to add trillions of dollars of debt, you know, to the well, to the deficit and to the ultimately to the national debt in order to give money. put more money in the pockets of rich people. The cruelty part comes in where they're trying to make it not look so bad. Instead of adding six trillion, it'll be only four trillion. So they can feel a little bit better about it.
But to do that, they're going to kick people off their health care. and kids aren't going to get meals. I mean, that's the cruel part, is hungry kids are going to continue to go hungry so rich people can pay less in taxes. And I'll say this, Ben, you know, I had some teachers in here today with some kids from schools in Arizona. And
These teachers pay a higher percentage of their income in federal taxes than many, many billionaires and millionaires. I mean, Warren Buffett is a guy who pointed this out all the time. The secretary paid a higher percentage of taxes than he did. And I think that is that that's true. And it's a problem. And we got to fix it. They're doing the opposite thing here.
They're making this situation worse.
You know, there was a moment, I don't know if it was a month or so ago, where Donald Trump had some tech billionaires in the Oval Office and he was asked a question about profiting off of his own meme coins. And he looked at the billionaires and he said, well, they're very rich. Why shouldn't I be rich?
And it feels like these MAGA Republican Congress members who hang out at Mar-a-Lago see all these billionaires and doing all the things that they're doing and saying, you know what? Me too. I deserve that as well. Look at what I'm doing for them. I want to be rich like them.
And the greed trickles down to all of the MAGA Republicans, but the wealth doesn't trickle down to the rest of the Americans.
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Chapter 6: How does budget policy affect the middle class?
Well, I got you on. I got to ask you a national security question, of course, which is Trump's trip to the Middle East. I think just a stain on the United States, you know, what he was doing in Qatar and United Arab Emirates. And Saudi Arabia, we know that the Pentagon formally accepted the free gold-plated Qatari jet.
But we're even seeing with the president of South Africa, President Ramaphosa, who was in the Oval Office today, basically saying, I'm sorry that I can't get you a jet if that's going to influence you. And just seeing...
Chapter 7: What are the implications of tax cuts for the wealthy?
how it is that the international community is now perceiving us, seeing China hosting that meeting last week with the Latin American and Caribbean countries, projecting itself now as a stabilizing force and speaking the way America once spoke, as America under Trump sounds like China used to speak, and me as an American saying, what the hell is happening here? It's gone upside down.
What's your observations of it from all the national security experience you have?
You're right, Ben. The big problem is China is going to step into this vacuum, a place where we were the most ethical. We were the leaders of the free world. We helped other countries when they were in need. It didn't cost us a tremendous amount of money. We fed starving kids on the other side of the planet just because they were starving.
And and the programs that we I was in South Africa last year and President Bush's PEPFAR program has saved more lives than probably any federal government program the United States government has ever supported was George Bush's program. And it provided medication and it kept babies from being born HIV positive. That program's ended because of Elon Musk and Donald Trump right now.
And kids are starving around the world because they don't think we should support these programs. And that gives a wide opening for the Chinese. On the question of the airplane, yeah, I mean, I saw the Ramaphosa press conference in the Oval Office, and I thought it – I mean, it's wrong to put this guy on the spot in the way.
And I don't know if the president put him on the spot or he just brought it up. But yeah, he can't bribe the president with a $400 million airplane. Only Qatar or the UAE or Saudi Arabia or maybe some other countries can do that. You got to call it what it is. It is a gift to a president outside of our laws. We have ethics laws that do not allow this.
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Chapter 8: How can we address inequality in taxation?
And these countries are going to expect something from it.
Senator Mark Kelly, keep us posted on the developments with the bill that you that you had there. And always you're invited back on whatever. We love having you on and hearing your wealth of experience.
All right. Thank you. Thank you, Ben.
Appreciate it.
All right, everybody. Hit subscribe. Let's get to five million subscribers.
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