Republican Rep. Tom Price currently sits on the House Budget Committee, where he has an early look at items to be pushed in the upcoming year. He was also a doctor before coming to the House, and is one of the go-to architects of plans to burn down the Affordable Care Act. The combination puts Price in a position where he has insight into policies that can affect medical firms before those proposals become general knowledge, and it seems Price has frequently moved to turn that insider knowledge into ready cash.
The top Democrat on the House Rules Committee is calling for the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to investigate healthcare stock trades by Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for Health and Human Services secretary. …
“Congressman Price was privy to information not available to the public,” wrote Slaughter. “The fact that these trades were made and in many cases timed to achieve significant earnings or avoid losses would lead a reasonable person to question whether the transactions were triggered by insider knowledge.”
Price has traded in at least 40 different healthcare companies in just the last three years. It’s blatant enough that Nancy Pelosi has asked the independent Office of Congressional Ethics to investigate Price—which may have something to do with Republicans attempting to get rid of that office as their first action of the year.
Trump transition spokesman Phil Blando called the Democratic charges "laughable."
A Congressman using insider knowledge to enrich himself? That’s not a problem in the Trump administration. That’s a role model.