Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) said Tuesday that the Justice Department has informed him it will not prosecute him for insider trading, making him the last of five senators known to have been investigated for selling stocks right before the market crashed when the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Burr sold up to $1.7 million worth of stock on Feb. 13, 2020, days after receiving briefings on the emerging coronavirus threat. Burr at the time was chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and a member of the Senate health committee.
Burr has acknowledged he sold the shares because of the pandemic, but says he was guided solely by public news sources, specifically CNBC's Asia health and science reporting. After the FBI executed a search warrant and seized his cellphone in May, he stepped down as chairman of the Intelligence Committee. Democrats take control of the Senate on Wednesday, and it's unclear if Burr will seek the top GOP slot on either the intelligence or health committees now that the investigation is over.
Three of the other senators investigated for possible insider trading — Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.), James Inhofe (R-Okla.), and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) — were cleared in May. An investigation into Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.)'s stock trades expanded but then was closed in August, The New York Times reports. Perdue and Loeffler were both defeated in special elections earlier this month and their Democratic successors will be sworn in Wednesday.
Burr has already said he plans to step down after his term ends in 2022, but the timing of his exculpation, on the final day of the Trump administration, raised some eyebrows. President Trump was not a fan of Burr, who led a bipartisan investigation into Russia's interference in the 2016 election, though Burr will now sit as a juror in Trump's second impeachment trial.
It was always a steep climb for prosecutors to prove criminality in congressional insider trading cases, The Washington Post reports. "The law under which Burr was investigated — the Stock Act, which prohibits members of Congress and other federal officials from trading on information they glean from their government work — has not been used as the basis for a criminal charge since it was passed in 2012." Peter Weber
President Trump has spent the last few days asking his friends, aides, and associates if they would like pardons — even those who are not facing any charges, a senior administration official told The Washington Post.
In one case, the official said, Trump offered a pardon to a person who declined the chance at clemency, saying they weren't in any legal trouble and hadn't committed any crimes. "Trump's response was, 'Yeah, well, but you never know. They're going to come after us all. Maybe it's not a bad idea. Just let me know,'" the official recounted.
Trump has taken a great interest in pardoning people, the Post reports, even calling families to personally let them know he granted a pardon. A person familiar with the matter told the Post that Trump was talked out of pardoning himself, family members, and controversial figures like Rudy Giuliani. An aide said there was also a brief discussion about possibly issuing pardons related to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, but that idea went nowhere.
While Trump has held a few ceremonial events in recent weeks, journalists have been kept away from the White House, largely because the president is "just not in a place where they would go well," one official told the Post. Trump is constantly flip-flopping, another administration official said, talking about his future but uncertain of where he will be. "He goes between, 'Well, I'm going to go to Florida and play golf, and life is honestly better,' and then in the next moment, it's like, 'But don't you think there's a chance to stay?'" the official said. Read more at The Washington Post. Catherine Garcia
Just because he's leaving the White House, that doesn't mean President Trump is ready to put politics behind him.
In recent days, Trump has talked with aides and friends about starting a new political party, called the "Patriot Party," people familiar with the matter told The Wall Street Journal. Trump wants to still exert influence over politics, they said, and thinks this is one way of making sure that happens.
Trump does have a loyal base, but it's almost guaranteed Republican officials would oppose the Patriot Party, due to fears it would attract too many GOP voters. Catherine Garcia
Twelve National Guard members have been removed from inauguration duties and sent home, following screenings to see if any of the troops were involved in extremist activity, Defense Department officials confirmed on Tuesday.
Two of the troops made threatening comments about politicians via text and on social media, Gen. Daniel R. Hokanson, chief of the National Guard Bureau, told reporters. He would not reveal the exact threats, only saying they were "inappropriate." The other 10 National Guard members were removed due to domestic abuse, criminal investigations, and outstanding complaints, The New York Times reports.
In the wake of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, officials have been looking to root out any troops with anti-government or white supremacist sympathies, and the FBI helped the military vet the more than 25,000 National Guard members being deployed to D.C amid the inaugural festivities. "At this point, we don't have the time to rundown every single piece of information," Hokanson said. "But there's enough information for us to determine to remove them from the Capitol."
Hokanson and other officials stressed that most of the National Guard troops are dedicated to protecting the United States, with Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) saying in a statement they "put their lives on hold to answer the call to service. They will defend the U.S. Capitol with their lives, and I trust them implicitly with mine." Catherine Garcia