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‘Politicians have too much power’: Sen. Tommy Tuberville just disclosed $250K in futures trading in corn, wheat, soy and cattle — all while influencing agricultural policies

Bethan Moorcraft
Wed, August 16, 2023 

United States Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) has just disclosed $250,000 in futures trading in wheat, corn, soy and cattle.

On August 14, Tuberville — who sits on the Senate Committee for Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry — reported multiple agricultural trades through June and July, all in the range of $1,000 to $15,000.

The former college football coach’s trades caught the attention of Unusual Whales, a data hub leading the crusade to expose insider trading and conflicts of interest among U.S. politicians.

“He literally influences agricultural futures via legislation and is trading it actively,” Unusual Whales wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter — before pointing out Tuberville has “previously, scored some big gains on futures in wheat, corn and soy.”

The U.S. public have had enough

This isn’t the first time Coach Tuberville, as his constituents call him, has been a target over his trades. In 2021, he violated federal transparency laws when he failed to properly disclose trades worth more than $1 million on time. His trades included the sale of stock options in the Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba around the same time that President Joe Biden issued an executive order targeting U.S. investments in Chinese companies.

“It is not only him. Members of Congress have inside knowledge of transpiring trends in the stock market,” one X user wrote in response to the Unusual Whales post.

Many high profile politicians — including Rep.Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Sen. Thomas Carper (D-DE) — have been accused of using their connections, influence and insider information to score winning deals.

Those alleged conflicts of interest have riled up the U.S. public, where there’s growing support for a total ban on stock trading among members of Congress, according to a recent survey by the University of Maryland’s Program for Public Consultation.

“Any politician who uses their position of power to influence for personal and/or financial gain should immediately be removed from office and prosecuted,” one X user replied to Unusual Whales. “These positions are elected and/or paid for by the people. Federal politicians have too much power as is.”

Attempts to ban congressional stock trading

Some lawmakers are trying to tackle this problem. A new bipartisan law was proposed in late July, which would ban members of Congress and the federal executive branch — including the president — from owning or trading stocks, even in blind trusts.

However, two other bills on this matter — the TRUST in Congress Act and the PELOSI Act — have failed to move the needle this year, and it’s unclear if or when the new proposal will be debated and voted on.