After three House terms and two unsuccessful Senate bids, Colin Allred is bringing congressional stock trading to the forefront of a Texas Democratic runoff against Rep. Julie Johnson, using the issue as both an indictment and a counterattack. In interviews and campaign exchanges, Allred has said voters press him on whether lawmakers are profiting from their positions in Washington, and he framed the dispute as part of a broader fight over trust.
Allred’s remarks captured the thrust of the race as he described what constituents ask him. “What about the stock trading in Congress? What about people getting rich in Congress?” Allred said he is asked regularly, adding, “you’re absolutely right about that, too. We need to be better.” He said he was challenging Johnson on trades involving companies such as Palantir, a data analytics firm with ties to President Donald Trump’s administration.
Johnson, meanwhile, contested the character of the accusations and said her trades were handled by a financial manager. She also accused Allred of running a campaign focused on himself. In that exchange, Johnson pointed to financial disclosures showing Allred’s wealth nearly doubling during his time in Congress, while Allred said his assets were held in a blind trust and that money came from his wife’s income as a partner at a law firm.
The candidates also clashed over the scale and portrayal of the Palantir trade itself. Johnson said, “To be clear, the sum total I made on that trade was only $90,” and she argued Allred was trying to depict it as far larger. The standoff, according to the reporting, is emblematic of disputes within the Democratic Party over money in politics—and over how hard to press anti-corruption messaging as Democrats prepare for potential gains in the midterms.
The broader political context is that Democrats see congressional stock trading and related financial activity as a vulnerability for their campaign against Trump. Trump campaigned on promises to “drain the swamp,” and as he returned to the White House, Democrats sought to regain the upper hand on the issue. Daniel Lobo-Lewis, a Washington political consultant who co-founded the Political Integrity Project, said many voters outside Washington do not differentiate between parties because they view politicians as bought by donors or by their own self-interest.
The Political Integrity Project, Lobo-Lewis said, asks candidates to sign an “integrity pledge” to refrain from trading stocks or accepting corporate donations while in Congress and to vow not to work as a lobbyist after leaving office. So far, the project has reported that about 90 challengers and seven sitting lawmakers have taken the pledge. Congress, however, has not yet enacted a stock-trading ban, even as insider trading remains illegal for members in the same way as for other people; multiple bills have been introduced but none have cleared.
Democrats have also been divided in how to frame the details and loopholes within rival proposals, with a bipartisan effort to ban congressional stock trading reported as having stalled despite Trump’s blessing during his State of the Union address. In this environment, the accusations often play out in Democratic primaries and runoffs, not just in general-election battles against Republicans.
Utah’s Democratic politics has been shaped by similar fights. In a crowded race, State Sen. Nate Blouin criticized former Rep. Ben McAdams for having equity in a Utah data center firm and attacked other candidates for past investments and jobs. McAdams’ campaign said equity of several thousand dollars was payment for a past contract completed while he was a private citizen, and it said the data center project would use no water and run on clean energy. A spokesperson for McAdams also accused Blouin of hiding corporate donations by removing them from campaign disclosure reports, and Blouin rejected that claim by saying he returned donations to donors.
Other Democratic contests have also featured personal-wealth attacks tied to financial disclosure issues. In a New York congressional district that includes both Wall Street and the Democratic Socialists of America’s headquarters, the former comptroller, Brad Lander, accused Rep. Dan Goldman of trying to buy another term by matching campaign contributions with his own wealth. Goldman’s campaign pointed to a blind trust after he took office in 2023 and said Lander was running a “deceitful campaign” based on what it called absurd lies. Lander responded that Goldman’s spending was “not illegal” but “certainly anti-democratic” and argued it worsened an affordability crisis.
As the next wave of elections approaches, the disputes have reached California, where even lawmakers who support a stock-trading ban face intraparty challenges. Democratic Rep. Brad Sherman has said he does not trade individual stocks and supports a ban; he told voters he only owned three individual stocks inherited from his mother. One primary challenger, Jake Levine, signed the Political Integrity Project pledge but criticized Sherman over what he said Sherman’s disclosures and his own financial statements do or do not show, while Levine said he is under a non-disclosure agreement and vowed to sell or move any individual holdings into a blind trust if elected.
In the race to succeed former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California State Sen. Scott Wiener also faced wealth-related criticism. Wiener said Saikat Chakrabarti, a former software engineer who earned millions at Stripe, had “enormous investments” and was trying to “buy this seat,” and Wiener criticized Chakrabarti for not disclosing the last decade of his stock trades. Chakrabarti said his wealth as a private citizen was not relevant to his future time in office and said he would place assets into a blind trust if elected, while also criticizing Wiener’s support by super PACs funded by corporations including the AI firm Anthropic.
The campaign exchanges across these races show how Democratic candidates are trying to turn public anger over congressional stock trading into political leverage, even as they trade counteraccusations about wealth, disclosures and financial management. The issue’s appeal to voters remains, but the internal fights suggest the party’s anti-corruption message is still being contested over how broadly it applies and who gets to define what counts as unacceptable.
This article has been updated to correct the last name of the co-founder of the Political Integrity Project. It is Agosta, not Agosto. The article was also updated to clarify that Jake Levine has not said his family manages his financial assets; he says he is under a non-disclosure agreement regarding them.