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kirsten gillibrand
Jewish-Led NYC Rally Targets AIPAC, Dem Allies Who Oppose Gaza Cease-Fire
"AIPAC uses money and racist bullying to ensure congressional complicity in the genocide of Gaza," said Jewish Voice for Peace.
Feb 22, 2024
Thousands of Jewish-led protesters descended on the New York offices of the American Israel Public Affairs Council on Thursday, taking aim at both AIPAC and Democratic lawmakers who take millions of combined dollars from the lobby group while opposing a Gaza cease-fire.
Led by Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), the demonstrators marched from Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza outside the United Nations—where earlier this week the U.S. for the third time vetoed a Security Council cease-fire resolution—to AIPAC's nearby New York headquarters on Third Street.
During the march, protesters carried large letters spelling "DUMP AIPAC" and a banner reading "AIPAC Funds Genocide," as well as signs listing the names of New York Democrats who take campaign cash from the group while opposing a Gaza cease-fire. Members of Congress named and shamed at the rally include House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries ($829,835 in lifetime AIPAC contributions), Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand ($348,818), and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer ($101,570).
Other activists occupied the offices of Schumer and Gillibrand. JVP said 18 people were arrested for refusing to obey police orders to leave.
"If you want to know one reason why more electeds aren't calling for a cease-fire—even though a cease-fire is the overwhelming demand from the people—look no further than AIPAC," said JVP. "AIPAC uses money and racist bullying to ensure congressional complicity in the genocide of Gaza."
"Last cycle, AIPAC endorsed over 100 lawmakers who voted to decertify the results of the 2020 election, allying themselves with the far-right," the group added. "AIPAC is threatening our safety here in the U.S. in order to ensure unconditional U.S. support for Israeli violence."
Jewish Voice for Peace Action said the demonstrators are "calling on Congress to listen to the will of the people and reject AIPAC as the extremist warmongers they've always been."
JVP posted on social media: "With over 30,000 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, we demand our electeds stop answering to a far-right group and start listening to their constituents. #DumpAIPAC now!"
The protest came a day after progressive Congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) led condemnation of AIPAC for a social media post accusing progressive cease-fire supporters of keeping Hamas' "rapist monsters armed and in power in Gaza."
"It is appalling that AIPAC is targeting women members of Congress who have survived sexual assault with this horrific rhetoric," Ocasio-Cortez fired back. "Each and every day, their role in U.S. politics becomes a greater scandal. They are the NRA of foreign policy."
Many of Israel's staunchest supporters on both sides of the partisan aisle have taken AIPAC contributions. The group was the number one donor to both Jeffries and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) during the last election cycle.
AIPAC has also been a top contributor to lawmakers like Reps. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.) and Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.), who not only vocally support Israel, but also attack colleagues like Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.)—the only Palestinian American in Congress—and Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) for their pro-Palestinian views. AIPAC was by far Gottheimer's largest contributor in the 2022 electoral cycle, donating more than $216,000 to his campaign. The same goes for Torres, who received over $141,000 from the group during the same period.
Last month, over 200 House lawmakers from both parties sent a letter to U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken condemning the South Africa-led genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice. Reps. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) and Kathy Manning (D-N.C.) led the letter. AIPAC is the top donor to both of their campaigns.
AIPAC is expected to spend upward of $100 million this cycle in an effort unseat over half a dozen progressive U.S. lawmakers who have been critical of Israeli genocide, apartheid, occupation, settler colonization, and other human rights crimes against the Palestinian people.
Meanwhile, Jewish-led groups like JVP and IfNotNow have led a historic nationwide wave of protests against the ongoing Israeli onslaught on Gaza, in which more than 100,000 Palestinians have been killed or wounded. These demonstrations have filled the streets of cities from coast to coast, shut down major transit hubs, occupied landmarks, disrupted President Joe Biden's campaign events, and much more.
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Ban Congressional Stock Trading to Help Control Pentagon Budget
Support for higher budgets can lift share values of members invested in weapons industry stocks. These votes for Pentagon increases may be based on other considerations, but trading creates the opportunity for self-dealing and profiteering.
Jul 30, 2023
A new bill being introduced by Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) would bar executive branch officials, members of Congress, and their families from owning or trading stocks in individual companies.
Efforts to curb or ban stock trading by members of Congress have gained momentum in the past few years, with a slew of bills on the topic, as well as major investigations by The New York Times and Wall Street Journal.
Letting members play the stock market creates conflicts of interest that are an invitation to corruption. This is particularly troubling when these deals involve members who have decision making power over spending on the Pentagon, intelligence, and homeland security. America’s security should not be for sale.
Investigations by major news outlets and non-governmental organizations have identified at least 25 members of key national security committees with investments in arms industry stocks.
Support for higher Pentagon budgets can lift share values of members invested in weapons industry stocks. These votes for Pentagon increases may be based on other considerations, but the key point is that stock trading creates the opportunity for self-dealing and profiteering on the part of key members of Congress. The temptation for corrupt decision making is itself a serious problem. Even the appearance of conflicts of interest undercuts public trust in the budget decision making process.
Investigations by major news outlets and non-governmental organizations have identified at least 25 members of key national security committees with investments in arms industry stocks, in firms ranging from top-ranked contractors like Lockheed Martin and Raytheon to lesser known companies like Huntington Ingalls Industries and L3 Harris.
Examples include Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and a prolific stock trader. Tuberville is best known for putting a hold on top military nominations to protest the Pentagon policy that covers abortion-related travel expenses for service members based in states with restrictive reproductive healthcare laws. The Pentagon estimates that Tuberville’s actions could impact 650 positions by the end of this year.
Meanwhile, Tuberville reported owning hundreds of thousands of shares in Honeywell, Lockheed Martin, General Electric, Raytheon, and General Dynamics since 2020. Additionally, he sold his shares of Microsoft about two weeks before it became public that the company’s $10 billion contract with the Pentagon was canceled. He also bet against a Taiwanese company whose stock is often affected by U.S.-China relations, as RS’s Connor Echols reported earlier this year.
Another SASC member, Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) reported co-owning $110,000 worth of shares in General Electric with her husband. Rep. John Rutherford (R-Fla.) bought shares in Raytheon on February 24, 2022—the day Russia invaded Ukraine. Rutherford sits on the House Appropriations homeland security subcommittee. Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.), who sits on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (and is the ranking member of the National Security Agency and Cyber subcommittee) has traded millions in Microsoft shares—the latest example being his purchase of three $1-5 million blocs of shares on May 15 and 16 this year.
There are a number of cases in which members have failed to comply even with the weak rules that are now on the books, which involve periodic reporting on stock deals.
As the Project on Government Oversight has pointed out, the best way to eliminate the potential conflicts of interest inherent in congressional stock ownership is to institute a comprehensive ban on trading in stocks by all members of Congress as well as immediate family members and senior staff—with no loopholes, and no complex work-arounds. POGO elaborated on the features of a strong stock trading ban in congressional testimony last year. Many recent legislative proposals fall short of this standard.
Stock trading is just one potential financial incentive for members of armed services, defense appropriations, intelligence, and homeland security committees to jack up military spending. Campaign contributions, arms-related jobs in a member’s state or district, and lobbying by former colleagues also exert pressure to up the Pentagon’s already enormous budget.
For example, Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, was the top recipient of defense industry campaign contributions during the 2022 midterm election cycle, getting over $511,000 in donations from weapons makers. The aforementioned Sen. Tuberville has received over $244,000 in arms industry contributions since 2017.
Meanwhile, in the past two years—prior to this year’s debt ceiling deal—Congress added $25 billion and $45 billion to the Pentagon budget, respectively, beyond what the department even asked for. Much of this funding was for projects in the districts or states of key members. And in many cases the member in question even issued a press release bragging about the items they added to the budget. These statements are almost always accompanied by a perfunctory argument that the additional spending is necessary for national security, but in many cases these protestations are just a smoke screen to hide the fact that these decisions serve special interests, not the national interest.
Adding unnecessary weapons to the budget for economic and political reasons is a form of legalized corruption that wastes scarce taxpayer dollars and undermines the possibility of aligning arms spending with a more sound defense posture.
Stock trading is just one piece of a larger problem of undue pressures on Congress to “go big” on Pentagon spending. But eliminating it would be a step in the right direction that might encourage initiatives to reform other practices that stand in the way of crafting a more realistic Pentagon budget in service of a more coherent defense strategy.
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Bipartisan Senate Bill Would Ban Government Officials From Stock Trades
"Sunlight is the best disinfectant. It is critical that the American people know that their elected leaders are putting the public first—not looking for ways to line their own pockets," said co-sponsor Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand.
Jul 19, 2023
A bipartisan pair of U.S. senators on Wednesday introduced a bill that would ban stock trading by federal officials including members of Congress, whose median net worth is around eight times greater than the median U.S. household's.
The Ban Stock Trading for Government Officials Act, introduced by Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), would bar federal lawmakers, senior executive branch officials, their spouses, and dependents from owning or trading stocks.
"Sunlight is the best disinfectant. It is critical that the American people know that their elected leaders are putting the public first—not looking for ways to line their own pockets," Gillibrand said in a statement. "This bill is the most substantive bipartisan effort to date and I'm going to work hard alongside Sen. Hawley to get it signed into law."
Hawley asserted that "politicians and civil servants shouldn't spend their time day-trading and trying to make a profit at the expense of the American public, but that's exactly what so many are doing."
The proposed legislation would impose penalties and fines for executive branch stock trading, mandate reporting of federal benefits, boost transparency in financial disclosures, and increase transaction reporting penalties under the Stop Trading Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act.
Enacted in 2012, the STOCK Act requires members of Congress to file annual financial disclosures in order to identify and take action when government officials use their positions of influence for personal gain. However, critics have long called the law largely toothless, while demanding more stringent safeguards against self-dealing by members of Congress.
Gillibrand and Hawley's bill is the latest in a series of bills that would ban members of Congress and their families from owning or trading shares, including the Ban Congressional Stock Trading Act, the Transparent Representation Upholding Service and Trust in Congress (TRUST) Act, the Ending Trading and Holdings in Congressional Stocks (ETHICS) Act, and the Bipartisan Restoring Faith in Government Act.
The senators said in a statement that 1 in 3 members of Congress—whose median net worth according to OpenSecrets was just over $1 million in 2020, compared with $121,700 for the median U.S. household—traded stocks between 2019-21. They also noted that 1 in 7 lawmakers violated the STOCK Act by not properly disclosing trades, while more than 3,700 transactions during the aforementioned two-year period potentially posed conflicts of interest.
On average, the stock portfolios of congressional lawmakers outperformed the S&P 500 by 17.5%, according to the senators.
Over 85% of U.S. voters from across the political spectrum support banning congressional lawmakers from trading stocks, according to a survey published Tuesday by the Program for Public Consultation at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy.
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