When then-Rep. Tom Price was exposed during his confirmation hearings (he now serves as Heath and Human Services Secretary, of all things) as having investments in healthcare companies that he, in his capacity as congressman, seems to have sought to then boost via his own legislation, it shook loose the revelations that in fact a great number of congresspersons have been buying and selling stock in the same industries and companies.
Whether this discovery is the first hint of a brand-new congressional corruption scandal or merely business as usual among wealthier-than-you lawmakers depends on who you ask, but the poster child for the practice was quickly pinned as New York Republican Rep. Chris Collins. Collins has been a steadfast booster of one particular company, Innate Immunotherapeutics, even encouraging other congressmen to purchase stock themselves. And like Price, he has championed legislation that would directly benefit the company he was invested in.
When reporters began to question Collins on this, Collins promised to divest from the Australia-based company before it began operations in the United States. That apparently was a lie.
The FDA last month approved a multiple sclerosis drug made by Innate Immunotherapeutics for clinical trials here. Collins, a Republican from New York, told The Buffalo News last week that he remains an investor.
That wasn’t the case months ago, when Collins told a reporter with the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle that by the time Innate reached the FDA-test stage, he’d “be out of it then.”
Collins owns nearly 17 percent of the company and is a member of its board. His two children, chief of staff, several campaign donors, and five fellow Republican lawmakers are also invested. Collins participated in Innate’s initial public offering in Australia and bought more stock after he pushed a bill that could help the company. His dealings with Innate have put him under investigation by the Office of Government Ethics, though he has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.
The Office of Government Ethics is a busy place, these days.
Anyhow, whether or not it is deeply crooked for elected lawmakers to own chunks of companies whose stock prices are then boosted considerably by the laws they themselves write is currently up for debate, this patriotic holiday week. But whether you come down on the pro or con side of that particular argument, Chris Collins specifically said he'd divest from this specific company by a specific time, and he doesn't appear to have followed through with that.
We'll just put a pin in that for now. It seems like the sort of thing that we'll be hearing more about, sooner or later.