Published in the Omaha World-Herald.

If I’m elected to serve Nebraska in Congress, I pledge not to trade any individual stocks and will lead bipartisan legislation to ban congressional stock trading, so that members of Congress put working people’s interests above their own financial gains.

Americans have lost faith in Congress, and it is Congress’ fault. We look at Washington and see political fighting and posturing with very little progress. We see self-dealing and sweetheart deals for billionaires and corporations while members of Congress get rich off the stock market.

The self-dealing must stop.

Just in the last year alone, 129 members of Congress have personally traded nearly $600 million worth of stock.

Members of Congress shouldn’t be getting rich off information they learn in private briefings. It should go without saying that they should be acting in their constituents’ best interest, not thinking about their stock portfolio.

Some of the most clear and egregious examples of this type of corruption came in the early days of the pandemic. U.S. senators were briefed on the emerging COVID-19 in February, and then several of them sold off millions of dollars worth of shares in companies, such as hotel chains, that they realized would take a hit in a pandemic.

We deserve representatives who put the interests of the American people above their own personal financial gains.

That’s why if I’m elected to Congress, I pledge not to trade any individual stocks.

It’s a pledge that’s easy for me to take. Frankly, I’m not in a financial position to be buying and selling stocks. Much more importantly, though, I have always approached my job in public service as a service to the public.

It is a great honor for me to represent my friends and neighbors, regardless of whether or not we agree on everything, and I take seriously the obligation to uphold that trust they place in me.

We desperately need Congress to step up and address the challenges we’re facing here in Nebraska — homes that are getting too expensive, a strained healthcare system, and everyday costs that just keep going up.

It’s hard to trust that members are really focused on those challenges when they’re so financially invested in the industries and corporations that they’re supposed to be overseeing and regulating.

Clearly many members of the U.S. Congress do not share that view and we can’t just rely on members making the right decisions. That’s why I’d also support legislation to ban, finally, members of Congress and their spouses from trading stocks.

This isn’t a Republican or Democrat issue. Politicians from both sides continue to trade stock.