Rep. Shalala Admits Not Disclosing Stock Sales After Pelosi Appoints Her To Oversee Bailout Billions

Rep. Donna Shalala has come out an openly admit that she did not report at least 6 stock sales that were made after she was elected to the house in 2018. 

The sales only became a topic of discussion after Nancy Pelosi appointed Shalala to a committee conducting oversight on the hundreds of billions of dollars being provided to companies through the coronavirus relief bill, according to Axios.

Shalala sold stock in Boeing, Alaska Airlines, Chevron, Conoco, and AMC after she was elected to congress in 2018.

She claims she made the sales to avoid conflicts of interest, but she did not report them within 45 days as it required by the STOCK Act. “I did file my disclosure report, so everybody knew what my holdings are. They didn’t know I was unloading the entire portfolio so I could put everything into mutual [funds] basically to avoid any conflict of interest,” she said, according to The Hill. 

Her spokesperson, Carlos Condarco, had previously said she was unfamiliar with the rules. “She had a misunderstanding about the periodic transaction report process and her need to report the sale of these stocks while preparing a blind trust. As a new member with a broker and attorney who were not familiar with the congressional disclosure rules, there was a misunderstanding.”

But Shalala said:

“Look, I knew what the law was. I missed the deadlines.”

She continued:

 “It was my mistake and I take full responsibility. I missed the deadlines. And I have to take responsibility, personal responsibility for doing that. No one else is responsible except for me.”

In terms of punishment, Shalala said she is open to whatever is deemed necessary: “Whatever they think is appropriate. Whether it’s a financial penalty or anything else. I’m really sorry I missed those deadlines in the process of trying to do the right thing.”

Recall, Kelly Loeffler and other lawmakers came under fire for selling stocks following a private congressional briefing on coronavirus, and shortly before the market crashed. Loeffler bought and sold roughly $1.4 million in stock.

“Ms. Loeffler reported that she and her husband bought about $590,000 of stock and sold about $845,000 of stock from Feb. 18 through March 13. If they had held the shares they sold through Monday, the stock would have been valued at $86,000 less than what they sold it for, according to the Journal analysis.” -WSJ (03/31/2020)