Chuck Schumer says he supports banning lawmakers from trading stocks: 'I would like to see it done'

• Schumer made his support for banning lawmakers from trading stocks public, telling Insider "I would like to see it done."
• Insider reported on Friday that Schumer convened a group of senators to hammer out an agreement.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer gave public support on Tuesday to his colleagues' growing efforts to rein in their fellow lawmakers' trades of individual stocks after he previously dodged questions on whether he would support such a ban.

"I believe in it," Schumer told Insider in response to a question about his position. "I have asked our members to get together to try to come up with one bill. I would like to see it done."

Schumer's comments come after Insider revealed on Friday that Schumer had asked a group of six Democratic senators to come together on a proposal to ban stock trading. The group includes Democratic Sens. Jon Ossoff of Georgia, Mark Kelly of Arizona, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Sherrod Brown of Ohio, Jeff Merkley of Oregon, and Gary Peters of Michigan. All but Peters have previously co-sponsored legislation to ban stock trading.

After initially voicing her opposition to a ban, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi reversed her position on the issue last month.

It remains to be seen how onerous of a ban either leader would support. Some proposals would ban the spouses of congressional lawmakers and top staffers from trading individual stocks. Insider's Conflicted Congress investigation found that 55 members of Congress and nearly 200 senior staffers have violated the current law aimed at stopping insider trading and avoiding conflicts of interests.

Insider has also rated every member of Congress and their office's compliance with the current law, which multiple lawmakers have said does not go far enough in stopping bad practices.

Sen. Kelly, who introduced the Ban Congressional Stock Trading Act with Ossoff last month, declined to set any kind of deadline on potential compromise legislation.

"I don't think is a horse race," Kelly told Insider at the Capitol, adding, "You want to get it right."

Kelly also wouldn't say which, if any of the competing bills was emerging as the framework for a unified effort. "We're talking about it … and we'll eventually come to some conclusion," he said of the working group. He held out hope, however, that change is coming. "This is something that the American people want," he said.

Brown, for his part, told Insider at the Capitol that the senators and their staff have been meeting for a few weeks and that they're still working out the differences between proposals senators have put forward. Merkley's Ban Conflicted Trading Act, a separate proposal from Ossoff and Kelly's, would apply a ban to senior congressional staffers but not to lawmakers' spouses.

"Do you include dependents? Do you include spouses? Do you include staff? Do you include the Federal Reserve? Do you include agencies?" said Brown, noting the differences at stake. "So yeah, all those questions are complicated, but it's clear that we should do something."