Elizabeth Warren Proposes Banning Members of Congress from Owning Individual Stocks

She also wants to make tax returns readily available.

By Stephan Cho  |  August 22, 2018 | 12:34pm
Photo by Win McNamee/Getty
Politics News Elizabeth Warren
Elizabeth Warren Proposes Banning Members of Congress from Owning Individual Stocks

With Paul Manafort and Michael Cohen just the latest Trump associates wrapped up in the president’s endless legal drama, Sen. Elizabeth Warren has revealed an ambitious new legislative package that seeks to tackle corruption in the Trump administration and beyond.

Warren announced The Anti-Corruption and Public Integrity Act in a speech at the National Press Club on Tuesday, which includes a proposal that would ban members of Congress and White House staff from owning individual stocks and replace them with government-managed investment accounts, as CNBC reports.

The proposal would also require presidential candidates to share years of previous tax returns, and continue to do so annually after they win office, in what’s been taken as a direct dig at President Trump’s still-mysterious tax return statements.

Warren also directly addressed Trump and the news of Manafort’s conviction in her speech.

“The truth is, it’s insane that we have to beg the president of the United States to put the American people ahead of his own business interests,” said Warren.

Manafort’s trial, says Warren, “has exposed how foreign governments hide their efforts to influence the American government through lobbying.”

However, Warren adds that there’s a bigger issue of political corruption at hand: that of big money influence on Washington, which has undermined American public trust in the federal government.

“This problem is far bigger than Trump,” Warren said. “It is a crisis. A crisis of faith.”

Considering that Trump ran, and won, on calls to “drain the swamp,” it’s clear that public opinion lies in favor of a major shift in how to run American governance, however compromised and often downright hypocritical its champion may be.

Warren denies rumors that she will run for president in 2020, and her proposal is unlikely to pass a Republican-majority Senate, but this could serve as a solid example for anyone looking to challenge the current administration in the upcoming primaries, and eventually, in 2020. Trump is no anomaly, but rather a supersized example of what’s ailing Washington.

 
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