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Speaker of the House Mike Johnson today asked for sympathy for members of Congress who trade stocks to supplement their income.
"The salary of Congress has been frozen since 2009," he said.
"At least let them engage in some stock trading so that they can continue to take care of their family."
However, trading and investing is not the problem that Americans take issue with. The issue is insider trading. Speaker Johnson knows this.
Story after story has come out about the increase in wealth of members once they get into office.
Having spent close to 20 years on Wall Street myself; it is a well-known fact that well over 95% of fund managers cannot beat the market. The only way members of Congress 'beat the market' and get rich is trading on information that is privileged, meaning, insider information, which is illegal.
Legally, no exemption for Congress to insider trading law exists. In practice, the combination of vague standards, political realities, and weak oversight makes successful prosecutions extremely rare. This fuels public skepticism about whether the rules are applied evenly.
Enforcement Reality
- Trading itself is allowed — Members can (and many do) buy/sell individual stocks, as long as they don't use material nonpublic information from their jobs.
- Enforcement is weak — No member of Congress has ever been criminally prosecuted or convicted specifically under the STOCK Act for insider trading. campaignlegal.org
- Disclosure violations (late or missing reports) happen frequently, with weak penalties (e.g., a $200 fine for first offenses). Many members have been flagged for late filings. businessinsider.com
- Investigations have occurred (e.g., some senators' trades around early COVID-19 briefings in 2020), but they typically closed without charges. en.wikipedia.org
The median U.S. congressional salary is $174,000. 70% of Americans can't cover a $1,000 emergency.
Speaker Johnson is advocating for criminal behavior. That is at a minimum unethical. He is lying to your face. That behavior is not 'Christian', that violates every facet of the Christian faith.
Speaker Johnson needs to resign immediately.
Calling for his resignation simply because he wants to preserve an investment option second in popularity only to real estate is excessive. We don't need purity tests to drive people away. Simply stop the insider trading. He has done very well for MAGA and for the country considering he has a razor thin majority to work with.
So I didn't hear a word about insider trading - did you? No one 'beats the market' to make money while in Congress without criminality. To ignore this is deceitful and def not 'Christian', it's simply supporting those who steal to stay in power. Whatever happened to putting assets in trust to be managed by 3rd parties? Appreciate your comment but found it lacking.
ALL Congress-critters volunteered for the job, were elected and moved to DC--because that's where the job is. Too dam bad they couldn't do due diligence like the rest of us and research the costs of living in DC; if you can't make ends meet, tough sh!t. You knew the salary when you ran for office, which is already the top 1% of all wage-earners in the United States. It's like I were to take a job in California, find out my salary won't cover my expenses, so embezzled to keep up income.
You are away from your job at the chive my friend.
It used to be a privilege to represent our citizens and now it seems to be a full time job until they retire. So why can't they get used to term limits and then get a real job then they could support their families.How much do they need to support their families $25 Million or in Pelosi's case $380 Million? My wife and I have our retirement checks and we live OK so why can't they? But then I do not call them by their congressional title that they want to be referred as either.
Mostly Democrats getting filthy rich.
Trump has made an astounding 3711 stock trades in the 1st qtr. of 2026....these are number a hegefund gets with algorithm trading.
Many of the companies he has invested in are also companies he has interacted with as president.
Trump refused to put his assets in a blind trust, he is just asking to get impeached.
Mom and dad used to have 50 shares of Chock Full of Nuts. Never found the paperwork to it tho.
My friends the wife and I are retired and recieve SS every month, which we paid into the SS Treust Fund every paycheck until we retired. We both got a cost of living raise this year, 2.5% if I remember correctly but that was wiped out when they raised the Medicare Part B to 204 dollars from 184 dollars. And then Congress which has a totally separate retiremment system whines about a pay raise when a large majority are millionaires. Cry us a damned river why doncha.