Exclusive | Trading places: Some progressive lawmakers who push for stock bans are the real wolves of Wall Street

Socialist ‘Squad’ Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) routinely rails about congressional colleagues trading stocks — yet nearly one in four of her progressive comrades in Congress are wolves of Wall Street, a Post analysis found.

As many as 24 of the lawmakers in the Congressional Progressive Caucus have enviable portfolios, annual disclosures filed with the Clerk of the House of Representatives show.

The top trader, Morgan McGarvey (D-KY), one of the caucus’ vice-chairs, brought in a staggering 106% return on his stock portfolio in 2024, surpassing the 71% return of Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) — whose trading is so infamous a proposed bill to curb Congressional trading was called the Pelosi Act. And it’s more than four times the S&P 500’s return for the year of 25%.

“As the sole Democrat representing Kentucky in Washington, I carry the voice of working-class communities,” McGarvey, 45, claimed in a statement when he was elected vice-chair. His net worth is $1.6 million, according to alternative data platform Quiver Quantitative.

The Kentucky Democrat, an outspoken critic of President Trump who’s called him “unfit to serve,” didn’t let that stop him trading between $1,000 and $15,000 worth of shares in Trump’s media company after the November election, which ended up being one of McGarvey’s few losing trades last year.

The most prolific trader among progressive lawmakers is Ro Khanna (D-CA), who vowed to co-sponsor the latest Congressional stock trading-ban bill introduced earlier this month, yet has made no fewer than 34,272 trades since he was elected in 2017.

He’s made a whopping 3,424 trades in the past year alone, trading $30 million worth of stocks, according to data from Quiver Quantitative provided to The Post.

The Silicon Valley lawmaker led a pack of pols who traded heavily this spring when Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs spooked investors and caused sharp market swings, with sales of more than 200 shares and options over just a week.

Khanna, 49, has so many holdings that his 2024 disclosure is 333 pages long. The California Democrat claims it’s all good because outside advisers manage trusts for his wife and children — something insiders called “nonsense.”

“It doesn’t mean that they don’t make phone calls,” said Michael Auerbach, founder of Subversive ETFs, index funds that track lawmakers’ trades.

“Why do you even have time to day trade, shouldn’t you be passing laws and protecting the country? It’s ridiculous,” he added.

Khanna’s office insisted he doesn’t trade stocks himself.

“He has pushed for years for a ban on trading and for the TRUST in Congress Act requiring independently managed trusts, and his voting record shows he is bold and principled in standing up for his values,” said Sarah Drory, a spokesperson for Rep. Khanna.

Other progressives with decidedly capitalist pursuits include:

• Rep. Val Hoyle (D-OR), who violated federal financial transparency laws by being late to disclose as many as 217 stock trades worth between $245,215 and $3.3 million last year. Hoyle, who serves on the Transportation and Infrastructure and Natural Resources House Committees, bought stocks including Boeing and ExxonMobil. A spokesperson for Hoyle blamed the trades on the lawmaker’s husband’s new financial advisor purchasing individual stocks without any direction from either of them.
• Rep. Jonathan Jackson (D-IL), who also violated federal laws by failing to disclose 31 stock trades in the required timeframe, made an impressive 43.1% return on his stock portfolio last year, where he holds $1.5 million. He sits on the House Committees on Agriculture and Foreign Affairs.
• Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-CA), grand-daughter of the billionaire founder of telecommunications giant Qualcomm, holds $18 million in stocks, mostly Qualcomm. Her office defended that she’s a co-sponsor of the latest Congressional trading ban bill. Jacobs is a ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Africa, where Qualcomm recently launched a new mentorship program.
• Rep. Dwight Evans (D-PA), who raked in a nice 42% return on his portfolio last year, serves on the Subcommittees on Health and Worker and Family Support. Some of the holdings in his $436,000 stock portfolio include biotech company Thermo Fisher Scientific. He was also active on the stock market on “Liberation Day,” making 8 different trades on April 2 this year.
• Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-TX), who is a ranking member of the Health Subcommittee, and whose stocks include Johnson & Johnson and Procter & Gamble, holds a cool $3.1 million in his stock portfolio. His office claimed he doesn’t actively trade and has held the stocks for years – and is also sponsoring the ban.
• Rep. Judy Chu (D-CA), who also sits on the Subcommittee on Health, day-traded Appolo Medical and Astrana Health, two health care stocks. She’s made 467 trades worth $7.1 million since being elected Congress.

“It should be illegal for lawmakers to day trade stocks, especially in industries where they can influence outcomes,” said Auerbach.

In a fundraising email blasted out by Ocasio-Cortez on Sept. 17 she noted how members of Congress have “access to sensitive, privileged information to be able to anticipate and legislate as part of their jobs.”

“Some use this sensitive information to make huge profits from buying and trading individual stocks that they know will perform well,” she said, calling the practice “unethical.”

At a virtual town hall hosted by AOC Thursday, the socialist lawmaker boasted “we seem to have a lot of momentum” for the bipartisan Restore Trust in Congress Act, the latest iteration of a trading ban.

“This is like a political hot potato that they keep passing back. Neither the Democrats or the Republicans have the political will to make this illegal. They’re consistently outperforming the market,” said Auerbach.