FBI questioned Feinstein over stock sales amid coronavirus pandemic, but ‘no follow up’
Sen. Dianne Feinstein was questioned by federal law enforcement in April concerning some stock trades made by her husband in January, as senators were receiving warnings about the impact of the novel coronavirus.
The senior California senator reported some stock sales of a biotech company on Jan. 31, when COVID-19 was waging in China and other countries but had not yet hit the United States or its economy in force. Her office said at the time that her husband made the sales and that her assets have been in a blind trust since she first came to the Senate in 1992.
She was one of four senators who received media coverage over the stock sales at the time, including Sens. Richard Burr, R-North Carolina, Kelly Loeffler, R-Georgia, and James Inhofe, R-Oklahoma.
Tom Mentzer, Feinstein’s communications director, said Feinstein last month “was asked some basic questions by law enforcement about her husband’s stock transactions,” and that he believes all the senators who were reported to have engaged in suspicious stock transactions related to coronavirus were approached to do the same.
“She was happy to voluntarily answer those questions to set the record straight and provided additional documents to show she had no involvement in her husband’s transactions,” Mentzer said in a statement to McClatchy. “There have been no follow up actions on this issue.”
The FBI seized Burr’s cell phone Wednesday night as part of an investigation into his stock sales, and Burr said Thursday he is temporarily stepping down from his post as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.
“You have to go with what they’ve said publicly. I don’t talk about the investigation. I’m going to let it play out,” Burr told McClatchy Thursday.
It’s unclear whether Inhofe and Loeffler are also facing ongoing investigations by federal enforcement.
McClatchy DC reporter Brian Murphy contributed to this report.
This story was originally published May 14, 2020 at 2:40 PM with the headline "FBI questioned Feinstein over stock sales amid coronavirus pandemic, but ‘no follow up’."
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