More financial problems for House Democrats are piling up as Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) chairman Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-NY) failed to report a series of stock trades he made on time, a potential violation of federal law.
Business Insider reported Monday that after Maloney’s mother died, he inherited significant shares in several major companies from her “including those of Apple Inc., Microsoft Corporation, alcohol conglomerate Diageo PLC, and investment management company BlackRock Inc” for a total value of $11,051. In June of last year, Business Insider asserted, Maloney sold the stocks but he did not publicly disclose their sale until last week.
“That’s a potential problem because federal law mandates that members of Congress publicly disclose stock trades in a ‘periodic transaction report’ within 30 to 45 days of making a trade, depending on the kind of trade,” Business Insider noted.
Filing late, as Maloney did, can expose a member of Congress to ethics investigations and potential fines.
Maloney himself admitted the mistake in a filing to the Clerk of the House of Representatives.
“During preparation for the filer’s [financial disclosure] report, it was determined that these 8 transactions totaling $11k should have been reported on a [periodic transaction report],” Maloney wrote on April 2 in a letter to the Clerk. “As soon as this oversight was discovered, this filing was submitted to provide full transparency into that sale.”
Maloney’s spokeswoman Libbie Wilcox told Business Insider that neither the House Ethics Committee nor the Office of Congressional Ethics has informed Maloney’s office of any investigation into the matter, but that the DCCC chairman is prepared to pay any fines associated with his apparent violation of federal law.
“We assume this is a routine belated filing issue, and if there is a penalty of course we will pay,” Wilcox said.
These revelations about Maloney’s mishandling of his financial disclosures come as the DCCC chairman faces a tough reelection of his own back in New York’s 18th congressional district. The district, which according to the Cook Political Report’s Partisan Voting Index has a one-point advantage for Republicans in voter registration numbers, is viewed as a top battleground in the campaign for control of the lower of chamber of Congress in the upcoming midterm elections.
Assemblyman Colin Schmitt, a Republican who has been an outspoken member of the state assembly, announced last week he is running against Maloney for the seat. Schmitt, in an appearance on Breitbart News Saturday on SiriusXM channel 125 over the weekend, made the case that Maloney has “abandoned” the district in favor of radical leftist Democrats in Washington, D.C., and was trying to protect House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s majority as DCCC chairman instead of representing New York’s 18th district.
“Our congressman has abandoned us; he’s sold us out, and I said before we deserve a congressman, not a Democrat campaign chairman, not somebody who votes a hundred percent of the time with Nancy Pelosi and whose sole job now isn’t to worry about the farmers in Orange County, isn’t to worry about the commuters in Putnam county, the taxpayers in Westchester County,” Schmitt said. “No, his priority is to divide this country to go to every single state of this nation and divide us politically for political gain. That’s unacceptable. That’s not somebody who represents a really a middle of the road, your family value or district that we have here right.”
Maloney’s decision to hire a number of radical leftists with checkered backgrounds and a history of violence — one was the “triggerman” for an Albany gang who defended looting as a form of legitimate protest, and another advocated burning down police precincts — has drawn significant criticism. In addition, Maloney — who is also a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) — has drawn scrutiny for politicizing misinformation he obtained from that committee perch to attack Republicans, as Breitbart News has reported.
This latest setback for Maloney is sure to embolden Republicans’ already rosy prospects of retaking the House in the November 2022 midterm elections. Only five seats out from a majority, Republicans are extremely bullish on their shot at sweeping back into control of the lower chamber and this latest development has the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) — the campaign arm for House Republicans — jumping for joy.
“House Democrats chose an incompetent crook to lead their campaign arm,” NRCC spokeswoman Samantha Bullock said in a one-sentence statement about Maloney’s failure to report stock trades as required by law.
The news also comes amid record fundraising hauls for House Republicans in the first quarter of 2021. House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy, the would-be Speaker of the House should the GOP retake the majority, raised $27.1 million in the first quarter of this year — an all-time record for any House Republican ever. House GOP whip Steve Scalise, who would likely assume the Majority Leader position should the GOP retake the House, pulled in a record-for-his-position $7 million in the first quarter. The NRCC itself also hit fundraising records in the first quarter, pulling in more than $33 million.