News from the Party

NEW: How A Stock Trade Scandal Unraveled Loeffler’s Campaign

April 2, 2020

New Loeffler disclosures reveal further sell-offs along with investments in a company making medical supplies even while Loeffler publicly downplayed the coronavirus threat

ATLANTA — Two weeks ago, the first reports broke about unelected “political mega-donor” Senator Kelly Loeffler’s stock sell-off scandal, where she and her husband dumped millions of dollars in stock and invested in companies that make teleworking software and COVID-19 protective gear — while she continued to claim “The economy is strong.”

Today, the Democratic Party of Georgia outlined the timeline of the “unseemly” transactions:

January 24th: Loeffler’s Senate HELP Committee hosts a private all-Senate briefing on the coronavirus threat — the same day as her first reported joint stock sale.

SELL – January 31st: Loeffler’s husband dumps nearly $100,000 worth of retail stocks — one of their first major sell-offs in the retail industry ahead of a nationwide downturn.

BUY – February 14th: Loeffler buys $168,000 of stock in Citrix Systems, Inc., a teleworking software company, along with another $168,000 in Oracle, which will go on to work with the federal government to combat the coronavirus outbreak.

SELL – February 26th: Loeffler’s husband and New York Stock Exchange Chairman Jeffrey Sprecher sells off $3.5 million worth of stock in their company ICE, just over 30 days after Loeffler’s private Senate briefing — the amount of notice ICE requires executives to give before buying or selling shares.

BUY – February 28th: Loeffler’s husband buys over $100,000 worth of stock in DuPont, “a company that makes COVID-19 protective garments.” Over the next few weeks, her husband will buy another $100,000 worth of DuPont stock while Loeffler still downplays the coronavirus threat.

BUY – March 10th: Loeffler claims “the economy is strong” and “jobs are growing” even after she and her husband dumped stocks — and the very same day her husband makes another $12,000 purchase of DuPont stock.

SELL – March 11th: Loeffler and Sprecher sell off another $15.3 million worth of ICE shares — just one day after her claim that “the economy is strong.”

March 20th: As the Daily Beast breaks the news of Loeffler’s stock sell-off scandal, one Republican candidate openly calls for her resignation and calls her “unfit to represent Georgia” as Republican House Speaker David Ralston expresses worries about “down-ticket damage.”

March 21st: The New York Times editorial board calls for the Senate to launch a full ethics investigation “and, if warranted…criminal prosecution” against Loeffler, and the Savannah Morning News decries her “potential illicit profiteering” and says the “Justice Department and…Securities and Exchange Commission should get involved.”

March 23rd: The SEC issues “a sharp warning” against using “nonpublic information” to trade on the coronavirus outbreak while refusing to comment on whether Loeffler and Sprecher are under investigation — the same day that Mitch McConnell’s super PAC, which had previously spent to boost Loeffler, leaves Georgia off its list of ad buys.

March 27th: Even more members of Loeffler’s own party distance themselves from her, with one prominent conservative calling the accusations against her “very relevant.” Outside Republican groups that previously backed Loeffler, meanwhile, “are now turning their attention elsewhere at a pivotal moment in her campaign.”

March 29th: A new report reveals the DOJ and the SEC have launched a probe into lawmakers’ stock transactions during the coronavirus outbreak, coming nearly a week after the SEC issued a warning against insider trading during the pandemic and refused to state whether Loeffler and her husband were under investigation.

March 31st: New disclosures reveal even more stock sell-offs by Loeffler and her husband while she continued to downplay the threat of coronavirus — and show investments made “in a company that makes COVID-19 protective garments.”

Read the latest coverage about Loeffler’s stock sell-off scandal: