A Tale of Two Senators

In the middle of March, when the coronavirus situation was still developing, news broke about the questionable stock trades of a few senators. First, came the story of North Carolina GOP Senator Richard Burr, who sold up to $1.7 million of stock at the time he was receiving private briefings on the growing health threat.  His biggest sale included companies that are among the most vulnerable to an economic slowdown. The trades looked suspicious.

The next day, came news that Georgia GOP Senator Kelly Loeffler sold $1.3 millions in stock after a coronavirus briefing.   She purchased stock in Citrix and Oracle, two companies that specialize in digital workplaces-- businesses that would be expected to do well in an extended economic shutdown.   Also pretty sketchy.

There were also reports about stock trades by Senators Diane Feinstein (CA) and Oklahoma's Jim  Inhofe, but they didn't look as serious or questionable. 

Loeffler and Burr seemed in a category of their own- and they quickly become the subjects of criminal investigations by the Justice Department.   The one big difference is that Loeffler has been doing everything she can to ingratiate herself with Trump, praising him at every turn.  On the other hand, Burr oversaw the senate intelligence committee investigation of Russian interference in the election, called Donald Trump Jr and Jared Kushner to testify, supported the findings of the Mueller report and was about to release the final report from his committee.

So is there a difference in the way these two GOP senators were being treated by the DOJ?  Wait-- there's more.  After these stories broke, Kelly Loeffler's husband (who is the CEO of the corporation that owns the New York Stock exchange,and who also knew his wife might be the subject of a DOJ investigation) gave a million dollars to a pro-Trump super PAC-- that sure is a lot of money!

In the meantime, Burr gets served with a warrant, has his phone seized by the FBI, with both stories immediately leaked to the press.  Loeffler, however, gets a chance to cooperate with the FBI-- no warrant, no leaks.  Hmmm-- are you starting to smell something fishy here?

Well guess what?  We found out this week that Loeffler's case has been closed (along with Feinstein's and Inhofe's).  That's it-- we're done here.

But not Richard Burr-- he's in a different category.  It seems that the DOJ investigation is going to hang over his head for a little longer- and perhaps he will have to face actual criminal charges.    But Kelly Loeffler is going to walk away scot-free even though it seems the two did pretty similar things.

Maybe that's how it should be-- that Burr's behavior is worse and that the donation from Loeffler's husband had no connection whatsoever with the treatment her case got.  Or can it be that the DOJ's behavior is so brazen, open and corrupt?  Can we really trust Barr's DOJ to do the right thing?