Rep. Tom Kean, Jr., who mercilessly attacked his Democratic opponent over stock trades during the 2022 campaign, disclosed that he failed to report to the U.S. House of Representatives six transactions made by a trust established by his father, former Gov. Thomas H. Kean, that didn’t notify him when the stocks were bought and sold.
Citizens were angry that legislators were trading stocks in public companies and profiting from the insider knowledge they were privy to on Capitol Hill. During the campaign, Kean accused Malinowski of buying or selling as much as $3.2 million worth of stocks, which he did not properly disclose since early 2020.
Kean said at least $1 million of those trades involved medical and tech company securities that had been influenced by the coronavirus response.
The Star-Ledger pointed out that Kean owns Big Pharma stock while he advanced the industry’s interest by opposing Medicare drug price negotiations and he has opposed several measures to combat climate change at the same time he owns Big Oil stock but the issue hurt Malinowski more.
“I hate to be rude, but Rep. Tom Kean Jr. is in way above his head,” said editorial editor Tom Moran. “He still won’t say where he stands on impeachment. Now he breaks the very rule on stock disclosure rule that he fried Tom Malinowski on. Oy.”
Malinowski, who was first elected in 2018, defeated Kean 50.6% to 49.4% in the 2020 election but in the 2022 rematch, the Republican prevailed with 51.4% over the Democrat’s 48.6%.
The Kean Family Partnership sold up to $30,000 in stock in Fidelity National Information Services and Global Payments in April and May and purchased as much as $60,000 in Crown Holdings, Danaher Corporation, J.P. Morgan Chase & Co, and Fidelity between April and July, according to Personal Transaction Reports (PTRs) filed with the Clerk of the House.
Naturally, Kean blamed someone else.
“This week, the attorney charged with overseeing my Personal Transaction Reporting for the House shared with me that transactions from a family trust account, which I have no control over, were shared with him in an untimely fashion despite regular check-ins and confirmation of accurate reporting,” Kean said.
Democrats hoping to replace Kean pounced on the apparent hypocrisy.
“You figure after all those negative ads Kean ran against Malinowski he’d make sure to get his fillings in order,” said Roselle Park Mayor Joe Signorello. “The hypocrisy of the Republican Party has reached astronomical heights, and this is just the latest example from Junior.”
“Tom Kean’s violation of the STOCK Act raises some serious questions about his ethics and honesty with New Jerseyans,” said counterterrorism expert Jason Blazakis. “This is unacceptable and as a member of Congress, Tom Kean should understand how to comply with basic transparency measures. I’m calling on a bipartisan ethics investigation into Representative Kean. No one should use their elected position to line their pockets and New Jerseyans deserve better.”
“Before he was elected to Congress, Tom Kean Jr. was selling off hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of pharmaceutical stocks at the height of the pandemic,” said former Working Families Alliance director Sue Altman. “Now that he’s in Congress, he’s neglecting to report trades altogether. No matter what office he holds, for Tom Kean Jr., his bank account and trust fund will always be more important to him than working New Jerseyans.”
While Democrats hungrily eye Kean as a vulnerable GOP member of Congress and some conservatives in the district are considering a primary contest against one of the few liberal Republicans in
Representatives Abigail Spanberger, a moderate Democrat from Virginia, and Chip Roy, a conservative Republican from Texas, joined to support legislation proposed by Sens. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., and Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., which would require lawmakers and their immediate family members to put any stocks they own in blind trusts, eliminating any perceived conflicts of interest.
The issue first caught on in early 2020 after it was revealed that some members of Congress had made trades early in the pandemic before the broader public knew the full scale of the upheaval in store.
In two Senate runoff races in Georgia, former Republican Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler were skewered by their opponents over their pandemic-related trading.
The issue was so compelling that Republicans grabbed the issue right out from under the Democrats’ noses after then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi resisted the idea of banning stock trades or requiring politicians to move investments into blind trusts.