Congressional ethics and securities trading restrictions
Congress's trading ban gets a GAO audit
The review would be due within two years of enactment, and the findings would go to the ethics committees that oversee the new rules.
The Senate amendment adds an outside check to the new ban on certain trades and holdings in Congress. It directs the Government Accountability Office to audit compliance and report the results to the supervising ethics committees.
- GAO would audit lawmakers’ compliance within two years.
- The report would go to congressional ethics committees.
- The new rules cover certain trades and holdings in covered financial instruments.
- The audit is part of a subchapter called “Banning Insider Trading in Congress.”
- Lawmakers in Washington would not just be told to stop certain trades and holdings
Lawmakers in Washington would not just be told to stop certain trades and holdings. A new subchapter labeled “Banning Insider Trading in Congress” would also build in an outside review, requiring the Comptroller General of the United States to audit whether members of Congress are complying with the new rules.
That matters because the audit is not a symbolic add-on. It is a formal check on whether the ban is being followed, and it gives the supervising ethics committees a written report on what the Government Accountability Office finds.
A compliance receipt for Congress
The audit sits inside a broader new subchapter that goes well beyond a single reporting duty. Along with definitions, it includes a prohibition on certain transactions and holdings involving covered financial instruments, a certification of compliance, authority for the supervising ethics committees and then the audit provision on top of it.
Under the text, the Comptroller General would have to conduct the audit no later than two years after enactment and submit a report describing the results to those ethics committees. In plain terms, members of Congress would face an outside check on whether they are complying with the rules, not just an internal one.
A record voters can look for
For voters, the practical change is accountability. If Congress is going to bar its own members from certain securities activity, the audit creates a record of whether the system is working as written.
The text also includes conforming amendments to title 5 and the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995, tying the new subchapter into existing federal ethics and disclosure law.