Rep. Roy on congressional stock trading: ‘let’s actually focus on eliminating the corruption’

WASHINGTON— On Tuesday, following recent controversy around congressional stock trading, Rep. Chip Roy (TX-21) joined WMAL radio's Vince Coglianese to discuss how the TRUST in Congress Act, a bipartisan effort he is co-leading with Rep. Abigail Spanberger (VA-07), would restore public trust by requiring members of Congress to put their investment assets into a blind trust while in office.

Full clip of the interview is available here and some key quotes are below:

• Well, I love that Nancy Pelosi's commitment to the free market is particularly strong when it comes to her own pocketbook, and her own ability to get fancy ice cream and her fancy freezers and refrigerators in her fancy house in San Francisco. Of course, she likes the free market when it fattens her wallet.
  
• It's not too much to ask Members of Congress who are coming in to serve the constituents, to eliminate the perception or the reality of trading based on their public policy positions.
  
• I don't want to discourage our best and brightest from serving, but you shouldn't be able to profit from being a public policy maker and making policy decisions. And for the love of God, you've been there for 40 years, if you want to go trade stocks, retire.
  
• But at the end of the day, Nancy Pelosi can afford whatever financial advisor she wants, she has, she doesn't need to have her hand and her husband doesn't need to have her hand in making decisions that benefits them financially, while making decisions about the policy interest of the United States of America. I don't think that's a hard call.
  
• My point is, let's have a debate on the floor of the House. And let's actually focus on eliminating the corruption, or the perception of corruption that this causes.

###