by Ben Whedon
Senate Democrats on Wednesday voted down a ban on lawmakers trading stocks that had included a voter ID provision in the legislation.
The 53-47 vote came on party lines and saw the bill fall short of the 60 votes it needed to advance in the upper chamber. The House previously approved the bill.
The lower chamber approved the “Stop Insider Trading Act” with the support of 13 Democrats, but the Wednesday vote in the Senate effectively kills the measure’s chances of passing before the midterms.
But Democratic opposition appeared to be driven mostly by the inclusion of a largely unrelated voter ID requirement. Republicans have pushed to pass the SAVE America Act, a marquis voter ID bill, but Democratic opposition has effectively blocked it.
In response, Republicans have attempted to put voter ID in other legislation.
House Majority Leader Tom Emmer said Democrats in the Senate “have once again let Americans down by voting down the Stop Insider Trading Act.”
“The bill, which almost every Democrat in the House voted against, would ensure that members of Congress are held accountable when buying or selling stocks,” he said on social media. “It is a shame that the Senate continues to vote down good, House-passed bills that the American people want to see made law.”
U.S. Rep. Bryan Steil from Wisconsin said lawmakers should not be “able to profit off of insider information.”
“I’ll continue my work to pass the Stop Insider Trading Act. I’m encouraged that 53 Senators voted to ban members of Congress from trading stocks this afternoon. Unfortunately, Senate Democrats filibustered this commonsense ethics reform,” Steil said on X.
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Ben Whedon is a reporter for Just the News. Zachery Schmidt is the digital editor of The Star News Network and contributed to this story.
Photo “Chuck Schumer” by Chuck Schumer.
