Rand Paul discloses, 16 months later, wife's purchase of stock in company behind COVID-19 treatment

Rand Paul
(Image credit: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Sixteen months late, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Wednesday filed a disclosure with the Senate revealing that on Feb. 26, 2020, his wife, Kelley, purchased stock in Gilead Sciences, a company that produces an antiviral drug used to treat COVID-19.

Under the STOCK Act, which prohibits members of Congress from using information not available to the public for private profit, the disclosure should have been filed within 45 days of the purchase, The Washington Post reports.

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The stock purchase and late filing raise questions about whether Paul and his family used information given to lawmakers about the coronavirus and the government's plans to fight it so they could make a profit, Prof. James D. Cox of Duke University told the Post. "The senator ought to have an explanation for the trade and, more importantly, why it took him almost a year and a half to discover it from his wife," he said.

Paul's spokeswoman, Kelsey Cooper, told the Post that the senator did not attend any confidential briefings about COVID-19, and after Kelley Paul's stock purchase, he filled out the proper reporting form. Paul just recently found out that the form was never transmitted, Cooper said, and after conferring with the Senate Ethics Committee, he filed the supplemental report and an annual disclosure on Wednesday. Kelley Paul made the stock purchase two days after a top WHO official said remdesivir "may have real efficacy" in treating COVID-19. According to Cooper, the purchase was between $1,000 and $15,000, and Kelley Paul ended up losing money.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.