YourVoice.Now Summary
Transparency & AccountabilityCorporate BenefitsMembers of Congress, the President and Vice President — plus spouses and children — would have to sell individual stocks and crypto.
Transparency & Accountability
- Conflict-of-interest rules — Members, the President and Vice President must divest individual stocks and similar assets
- Conflict-of-interest rules — Spouses and dependent children fall under the same ownership ban
- Qualified blind trusts — No longer permitted as an alternative to selling
- Divestment deadline — Falls at the start of the officeholder's next term, not a fixed date after enactment
- Financial disclosure databases — Filings must be searchable, sortable and downloadable by filer, asset and ticker
- Financial disclosure databases — Access through an application programming interface required
- STOCK Act late-filing fine — Set at $500 per missed report, with waiver authority removed
- Federal benefits reporting — Government loans, contracts and grants to an official's family must be reported
- Ethics office publication — Penalties, extensions, trust dissolutions and exemption rulings posted publicly
Corporate Benefits
- Capital gains deferral — Certificates of divestiture extended to covered officials for required sales
- Corporate bond carve-out — Investment-grade bonds already held at enactment excluded from divestiture
- Small business carve-out — Ethics office may exempt a small business interest it finds conflict-free
The details
Members of Congress, the President, and the Vice President would have to give up individual investments. The ban covers stocks, commodities, futures, and digital assets such as cryptocurrency. It reaches synthetic versions too, including options and warrants. It also reaches indirect stakes held through a fund, a holding company, a trust, or a deferred compensation deal. Spouses and dependent children under 19 are covered on the same terms. Diversified mutual funds, diversified ETFs, and Treasury bonds stay allowed. So do state and city bonds, government retirement plans, and a spouse's pay from their regular job. Buying would stop the day the bill becomes law. Selling would be restricted 90 days later, except when selling in order to comply. The deadline to finish divesting is not a fixed date. It arrives when the officeholder starts their next term. For a Senator elected in 2024, that could be years away. Blind trusts would no longer work as a substitute for selling. Existing ones would have to sell their covered holdings and dissolve. Officials forced to sell would get a tax break already available to executive branch appointees. It lets them roll the proceeds into diversified funds and defer capital gains tax. Several carve-outs remain, including Alaska Native settlement stock, corporate bonds already held, and small business or family farm interests the ethics office clears. Enforcement runs through the congressional ethics offices. After a written notice, an official still holding a banned asset faces a penalty every 30 days. The amount is the greater of one month's salary or 10 percent of the asset's value. Officials would also have to report federal loans, contracts, and grants flowing to their family or family businesses. The bill separately sets a $500 fine for each late stock-trade report, blocking the waivers available today. That takes effect in 2027. Within 18 months the House and Senate would have to publish disclosures in a real database. It would be searchable by filer, asset, ticker symbol, amount, and date, with an interface for outside software.
Congressional Summary
Halting Ownership and Non-Ethical Stock Transactions (HONEST) ActThis bill generally prohibits the President, Vice President, and Members of Congress (and their spouses and dependents) from owning, acquiring, or selling certain investments, including individual stocks and digital assets. Violations are subject to specified civil penalties.Under the bill, covered officials and their spouses and dependents may not purchase or sell individual stocks, digital assets, or related financial instruments that are not diversified investment funds, Treasury securities, or certain other holdings.The bill also prohibits covered officials, their spouses, or their dependents from maintaining a qualified blind trust. The bill requires covered officials to divest from prohibited investments they, their spouse, or their dependent owns or controls. The bill establishes processes for divestment from qualified blind trusts and disposition of certain inherited investments. Violations are subject to specified civil penalties.Covered officials, their spouses, and their dependents are prohibited from controlling or purchasing prohibited investments until 90 days after the covered official ceases to serve in office.Each applicable supervising ethics office must make related information (e.g., certain notices of divestiture; descriptions of assets held in trusts; and federal loans, grants, or related benefits that the official received) available online in a searchable format.Further, the bill imposes penalties on Members of and candidates for Congress and congressional employees for failing to comply with existing financial disclosure requirements.
Legislative Subjects
Details
- Congress
- 119th
- Chamber
- Senate
- Status
- summarized
- Action
- Reported to Senate
- Action Date
- 2025-12-10
- Date Added
- 2026-07-29
- Source
- Congress.gov →
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