Elizabeth Warren rips Tom Price's explanation for his questionable stock purchases: 'Wink wink, nod nod, we're all supposed to believe that?'

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) went into the hearing for President-elect Donald Trump's health and human services nominee Wednesday with guns ablazing.

Throughout the hearing, Democrats raised a fuss about the fact that Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.) bought between $1,001 and $15,000 worth of shares in medical device manufacturer Zimmer Biomet Holdings Inc. last March, CNN reported, and then just days later introduced legislation that would have stalled a regulation that could have hurt the company. Warren seized on that point: "I'm not asking you about what you supported, I'm just asking: Did you buy the stock and then did you introduce a bill that would be helpful to the companies you just bought stock in?"

"The stock was bought by a broker who was making those decisions, I wasn't making those decisions," Price explained.

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After a short back and forth, Warren sought to clarify: "Let's just be clear … This is someone who buys stock at your direction. This is someone who buys and sells the stock you want them to buy and sell."

"That's not true, senator," Price said.

"Well, because you decide not to tell them?" Warren fired back. "Wink wink, nod nod? And we're all just supposed to believe that?"

Warren even got into a short spat with Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), the committee chairman, when he tried to tell her that her time was up. Watch the exchange below. Jeva Lange