John,

This past week, news broke that Senator Rand Paul did not report his wife’s February 2020 stock purchases of ​​Gilead, the company whose antiviral drug was the first to receive emergency use authorization as a potential Covid-19 treatment from the Food and Drug Administration in May 2020.

Consider the timing of when she bought this stock, months before the drug was used as an antiviral treatment and before the American public understood the serious nature of the virus.

This is the latest example of Members of Congress using confidential information to serve their own financial interests.

Last year, former Senator Kelly Loeffler was caught in a highly suspicious stock trade when she sold off $20 million in stock between a classified Covid-19 briefing on January 24, 2020 and when the market crashed in March -- all while misleading the public about the dangers of the coronavirus.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez reminded us this week that she has already introduced legislation to address this unethical behavior: the Ban Conflicted Trading Act, a bill that would bar members of Congress and senior congressional staff from buying or selling individual stocks.

With enough public pressure from you and progressives across the country, we can force Democrats in Congress to respond.

Join me, AOC, and DFA as we demand Congress pass the Ban Conflicted Trading Act to stop members of Congress from buying and selling individual stocks for personal gain.

Members of Congress and their closest staff have access to information that can impact stock prices beyond what is available to the average American.

They should not be allowed to profit from their positions of power.

That’s why the Ban Conflicted Trading Act is so critical.

The premise is simple. Any elected official, no matter their party, should be banned from buying or selling individual stocks.

Members of Congress are elected to represent the interests of the people, not the amount of money in their brokerage accounts.

Stand with me, AOC, and DFA to and demand Congress pass the Ban Conflicted Trading Act, a way to keep members from acting on private information to buy and sell individual stocks for personal gain.

Congress’ first obligation is to the American people. Acting on nonpublic information to cash out before crashes — and invest in the individual stocks of companies well before anyone in the general public would have thought to — because of your privileged status as a Member of Congress is corruption, plain and simple.

Together, we can stop Congress from putting their financial interests before the health, safety, and welfare of the American people.

Thank you for taking action.

In solidarity,

Robert Reich
Former Secretary of Labor
Co-Founder, Inequality Media Civic Action