President Donald Trump is facing heated criticism for engaging in over 3,600 stock trades during the first quarter of 2026 — but a powerful senator is arguing that Trump’s actions are merely an egregious symptom of a much more systemic problem.
“Over 80 percent of Americans believe that their elected officials are engaged in some type of corruption, and over 80 percent want to see bans on stock trading — not just in Congress, but across the country,” Sen. Andy Kim (D-NJ) told The Bulwark’s John Avlon in an interview that dropped on Sunday. The interview was featured in an article with the headline, "Sen. Andy Kim Exposes Congress’ Dirty Secret."
“He just went to China. He brought 17 CEOs with him. [Fifteen] of those companies had CEOs with him. He is invested in their companies. He has stock in those companies. We have seen him take on Palantir stock. I helped pass one of those pieces. So we're really showing the magnitude of what President Trump is doing right now.”
After Avlon pointed out that Trump’s trading amounts to $700 million, more than all of Congress combined, Kim argued that Trump’s actions are part of a larger pattern of politicians making money despite their conflicts of interest. Yet Trump, he added, has taken things to the next level.
“The way I frame it is: if you have a job whose job description is in the Constitution of the United States — whether that means you're a president or a vice president, a member of Congress, a Supreme Court justice, cabinet officials, senior officials across these three branches — you should be held to the highest of standards,” Kim told Avlon. “There should be no doubt about whether or not you are taking action that is going to benefit the country or benefit your own bank account and stock portfolio. That's what is causing so much distrust right now.”
If there is any silver lining to the current scandal, Kim added, it is that it creates an incentive for Americans to push for legislation reforming the status quo.
“I think that there is momentum towards banning members of Congress from trading stocks — that's a sea change from when a few of us started down this path back in 2019, when a number of us were elected into Congress, many of us elected because of our anti-corruption platforms,” Kim wrote. “Even the president, in his State of the Union, talked about banning members of Congress from trading stocks — but not for him. So that's the problem, right? We may very well end up getting some more momentum on banning members of Congress, but without it applying to the president. We've heard about Hegseth and others and some potential actions that they've taken. This is the absolute right time for us to be able to move forward and say, we need something across all three branches.”
Kim added that he and his fellow Senate Democrats “are already drawing up the lists, as well as the understanding of what investigations need to be done” to learn more about Trump’s stock trades and other financial scandals, including the $1.8 billion slush fund for his political supporters.
“What is it that we can do with subpoena power?” Kim asked. “What documents, what people do we want to come before us? And the prioritization of that is going to be so important — both for bringing to light the documents that are necessary to show the paper trail of the crimes that are being committed now, and for setting the stage for accountability on as many different platforms as we can moving forward.”
Kim has been one of the most outspoken members of Congress in terms of opposing Trump’s agenda. In December, for example, he vociferously spoke out against Trump adding his name to the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts despite him lacking the legal authorization to do so.
"If that’s correct, this needs to stop as it’s illegal to change without Congress," Kim warned.
