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Senator Dumped Up to $1.6 Million of Stock After Reassuring Public About Coronavirus Preparedness
ProPublica ^

Posted on 03/19/2020 2:37:14 PM PDT by TigerClaws

Soon after he offered public assurances that the government was ready to battle the coronavirus, the powerful chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Richard Burr, sold off a significant percentage of his stocks, unloading between $582,029 and $1.56 million of his holdings on Feb. 13 in 29 separate transactions.

As the head of the intelligence committee, Burr, a North Carolina Republican, has access to the government’s most highly classified information about threats to America’s security. His committee was receiving daily coronavirus briefings around this time, according to a Reuters story.

A week after Burr’s sales, the stock market began a sharp decline and has lost about 30% since.

On Thursday, Burr came under fire after NPR obtained a secret recording from Feb. 27, in which the lawmaker gave a VIP group at an exclusive social club a much more dire preview of the economic impact of the coronavirus than what he had told the public.

“Senator Burr filed a financial disclosure form for personal transactions made several weeks before the U.S. and financial markets showed signs of volatility due to the growing coronavirus outbreak,” his spokesperson said. “As the situation continues to evolve daily, he has been deeply concerned by the steep and sudden toll this pandemic is taking on our economy.”

Burr is not a particularly wealthy member of the Senate: Roll Call estimated his net worth at $1.7 million in 2018, indicating that the February sales significantly shaped his financial fortunes and spared him from some of the pain that many Americans are now facing.

He was one of the authors of the Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Act, which shapes the nation’s response to public health threats like the coronavirus. Burr’s office did not respond to requests for comment about what sort of briefing materials, if any, on the coronavirus threat Burr may have seen as chair of the intelligence committee before his selling spree.

According to the NPR report, Burr told attendees of the luncheon held at the Capitol Hill Club: “There’s one thing that I can tell you about this: It is much more aggressive in its transmission than anything that we have seen in recent history ... It is probably more akin to the 1918 pandemic.”

He warned that companies might have to curtail their employees’ travel, that schools could close and that the military might be mobilized to compensate for overwhelmed hospitals.

The luncheon was organized by the Tar Heel Circle, a club for businesses and organizations in North Carolina that are charged up to $10,000 for membership and are promised “interaction with top leaders and staff from Congress, the administration, and the private sector.”

Burr’s public comments had been considerably less dire. In a Feb. 7 op-ed that he co-authored with another senator, he assured the public that “the United States today is better prepared than ever before to face emerging public health threats, like the coronavirus.” He wrote, “No matter the outbreak or threat, Congress and the federal government have been vigilant in identifying gaps in its readiness efforts and improving its response capabilities.”

Read More

Burr was one of just three senators who in 2012 opposed the bill that explicitly barred lawmakers and their staff from using nonpublic information for trades and required regular disclosure of those trades. In opposing the bill, Burr argued at the time that insider trading laws already applied to members of Congress. President Barack Obama signed the bill, known as the STOCK Act, that year.

Stock transactions of lawmakers are reported in ranges. Burr’s Feb. 13 selling spree was his largest stock selling day of at least the past 14 months, according to a ProPublica review of Senate records. Unlike his typical disclosure reports, which are a mix of sales and purchases, all of the transactions were sales.

His biggest sales included companies that are among the most vulnerable to an economic slowdown. He dumped up to $150,000 worth of shares of Wyndham Hotels and Resorts, a chain based in the United States that has lost two-thirds of its value. And he sold up to $100,000 of shares of Extended Stay America, an economy hospitality chain. Shares of that company are now worth less than half of what they did at the time Burr sold.

The assets come from accounts that are held by Burr, belong to his spouse or are jointly held.


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; US: California
KEYWORDS: california; diannefeinstein; insidertrading; richardcblum; sanfrancisco
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To: TigerClaws

Your reckon that all 535 Insider’s have sold their stocks!


61 posted on 03/19/2020 3:29:16 PM PDT by Taxman ((We will never be a truly FRee people so long as we have the income tax and the IRS!))
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To: TigerClaws

“...the powerful chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Richard Burr...”
___

Richard Burr may be the titular head of that committee but Mark Warner is the one that runs it.


62 posted on 03/19/2020 3:30:14 PM PDT by lakecumberlandvet (Appeasement never works.)
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To: All


And he and Lindsey Graham have been shielding the Bidens from Investigation.

He’s allowed Mark Warner (VA) to run that Committee.


63 posted on 03/19/2020 3:30:17 PM PDT by AnthonySoprano
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To: TigerClaws

Assholes.

Unfortunately the bastards have made insider trading legal ONLY for themselves.

How else can you become an overnight millionarie from a middle class job?

I hate these people.


64 posted on 03/19/2020 3:31:48 PM PDT by Sequoyah101 (We are governed by the consent of the governed and we are fools for allowing it.)
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To: JoSixChip

Imagine also how much different things could have been in the whole Russia collusion conspiracy if Senator Burr had been on the side of President Trump and not on the side of the attempted coup. The media will probably now mention often that he is a Republican without mentioning that he voted against President Trump in every important way during the attempted coup. I wish Burr could be dumped now.


65 posted on 03/19/2020 3:33:29 PM PDT by Freee-dame
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To: TigerClaws

Martha Stewart can give him the 411 on life on the inside.


66 posted on 03/19/2020 3:36:12 PM PDT by HollyB
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To: TigerClaws

I propose all US senators donate all post-january stock profits to the IRS or resign immediately.

just so we know they are not on the take.

otherwise, tar and feather, and run out of town.

ah yes, and burn DC to the ground.


67 posted on 03/19/2020 3:36:37 PM PDT by SteveH (intentionally blank)
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To: lakecumberlandvet

> Richard Burr may be the titular head of that committee but Mark Warner is the one that runs it.

W T F


68 posted on 03/19/2020 3:38:20 PM PDT by SteveH (intentionally blank)
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To: Captain Peter Blood

Peter Schweizer’s outstanding book “Secret Empires” explains how Congress passed legislation making it illegal for them to make investments based on insider trading. Then, in a later piece of legislation, they took it all back. Congress is so corrupt.


69 posted on 03/19/2020 3:40:51 PM PDT by Freee-dame
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To: Mariner
Well liars lie....

I've no use for him,,,and about 80% of Congress..

I don't know about the timing...I was getting stopped out about that time also.....Mid Feb...

https://stockcharts.com/h-sc/ui?s=DOW

70 posted on 03/19/2020 3:42:10 PM PDT by Osage Orange (Whiskey Tango Foxtrot)
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To: SteveH

Good luck with that........


71 posted on 03/19/2020 3:42:59 PM PDT by Osage Orange (Whiskey Tango Foxtrot)
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To: TigerClaws

Are the others dumb enough to have tapes?????


72 posted on 03/19/2020 3:44:17 PM PDT by napscoordinator (Trump/Hunter, jr for President/Vice President 2016)
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To: TigerClaws

Now I’m really pissed! This asshole has to go down for this!


73 posted on 03/19/2020 3:46:36 PM PDT by 6ppc (If preteens acted like Democrats they would be grounded for life!)
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To: LegendHasIt

Very generous. I am having a hard time thinking of one. Seriously. They are naturally scummy. They lie, cheat, steal to get elected and re-elected. They will dumb on anybody to get ahead.


74 posted on 03/19/2020 3:47:52 PM PDT by napscoordinator (Trump/Hunter, jr for President/Vice President 2016)
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To: TigerClaws

All representatives and senators use inside information in order to enrich themselves/avoid financial disaster that the rest of us peons don’t have.


75 posted on 03/19/2020 3:49:51 PM PDT by Old Yeller (Auto-correct has become my worst enema.)
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To: rintintin
Does that mean you’re defending Burr? You use the “everybody does it” excuse?

Does getting intelligence briefings constitute insider trading? How about watching Fox Business or reading Forbes? The question is quite relevant.

Burr has a big target painted on his chest, in hopes of replacing him with a Democrat. Pro Publica is a well known liberal investigative enterprise. The article is somewhat vague, even the bit about a "secret" recording. Until I see some evidence that he actually violated a law, I will put this down as a Democrat hit piece.

76 posted on 03/19/2020 3:50:28 PM PDT by centurion316 (.)
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To: NonValueAdded
Why arent they required to have a blind trust?

That would be the most effective way to get self-imposed term limits, on all of CONgress.

77 posted on 03/19/2020 4:02:26 PM PDT by rfp1234
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To: Texas Eagle

Why are Congressholes even allowed to participate in the stock market when they are in office? This must end.


This is really unbelievable politburo sh*t. THESE PEOOLE get elected (and re-elected ad nauseum) to office - and the little people electing them lose their pensions over it??

We need term limits and stricter rules on our “representatives”


78 posted on 03/19/2020 4:05:59 PM PDT by Yaelle
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To: TigerClaws
Collins (R) of New York, got three years incarceration for doing less damage to the country.
They called it "insider trading" when his big pharma investment didn't make the FDA test.
Sounds to me more like "Selective Prosecution" against the New York congressman.
79 posted on 03/19/2020 4:06:14 PM PDT by Tilted Irish Kilt
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To: TigerClaws
He is a republican and he will hang in due course.

As he should but if it was a demonrat, silent as a mouse

80 posted on 03/19/2020 4:07:58 PM PDT by eartick (Stupidity is expecting the government that broke itself to go out and fix itself. Texan for TEXIT!)
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