Comment on Avoiding financial conflicts in Congress takes work. These lawmakers put in the extra effort — and wish more colleagues would, t

Avoiding financial conflicts in Congress takes work. These lawmakers put in the extra effort — and wish more colleagues would, t

Rebecca Zisser/InsiderSen. Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat of Massachusetts, is an anticorruption advocate.Patrick Semansky-Pool/Getty Images The STOCK Act is designed to ensure lawmakers are financially transparent and accountable. Some use qualified blind trusts or exchange-traded funds or abstain from playing the market. Congress has considered, but not implemented, stricter stock-trading rules for its members. Though several investment scandals have rocked the US Capitol, few lawmakers aggressively seek to ward off any specter of insider trading by handing their finances over to impartial money managers. Only 10 sitting members of Congress — nine Democrats and one Republican — have reported using what's known as a qualified blind trust, a formal arrangement, requiring congressional approval, in which a lawmaker officially transfers management of their financial assets to an independent trustee. While congressional guidance suggests the trusts provide the "most comprehensive approach" to avoiding "potential conflicts of interest or the appearance of such conflicts," they can be expensive and time-consuming to establish.As part of the exhaustive Conflicted Congress project, in which Insider reviewed nearly 9,000 financial-disclosure reports for every sitting lawmaker and their top-ranking staffers, Insider identified only six senators and four House members with qualified blind trusts.The senators were Democratic Sens.

 

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