Rep. Jonathan Jackson (D-Ill.) has violated a federal conflicts-of-interest and transparency law with a series of tardy stock trade disclosures.
Again.
Congressional financial disclosure reports reviewed by OpenSecrets indicate that Jackson was weeks, and in some cases months, late disclosing 31 stock trades made earlier this year by his wife. Among those stocks: Amazon, pharmaceutical firm Eli Lilly and Company, banking giant Goldman Sachs Group, IBM, Facebook parent company Meta Platforms and T-Mobile US.
Taken together, the stock trades are worth at least $30,030 and could reach as much as $450,000. (Lawmakers are only required to disclose trade values in broad ranges.)
The Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act requires lawmakers to disclose, within 45 days, any stock, bond or cryptocurrency sale they make, along with transactions made by spouses or dependent children.
In a signed disclosure filed Monday with the clerk of the House of Representatives, Jackson wrote that his spouse opened a new IRA account with Morgan Stanley in March.
“Morgan Stanley did not forward information about the Rollover IRA account transactions to the filer’s financial disclosure preparer until August 2025. Going forward, reportable transactions within this account will be reported on a timely basis,” Jackson wrote.
Jackson also noted that “neither the filer nor the filer’s spouse direct transactions within the account.”
But the House Ethics Committee instructs lawmakers that members themselves — not their financial advisers — are “personally responsible for incomplete and inaccurate information contained in your [financial reports], regardless of who assisted in preparation.”
House Ethics Committee Chief Counsel Tom Rust declined to comment on Jackson’s situation.
Jackson’s office acknowledged inquiries from OpenSecrets but did answer emailed questions about Jackson’s trades.
This is the second time since 2023 that Jackson has violated the STOCK Act. Raw Story reported that year that Jackson was late disclosing up to $300,000 in stock trades from a joint trust.
“We announced that the filing was delayed, and we take this matter seriously. However, I want to emphasize that we are now in full compliance, and I’ve implemented measures to ensure timely filings in the future,” Jackson said at the time. “Setting up the new office, we’ve changed a compliance officer, and that contributed to the delay, so very comfortable with our team now.”
Jackson joins a growing roster of federal lawmakers who’ve this year violated the STOCK Act with late trades.
They include Democratic Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, Dwight Evans of Pennsylvania, Jamie Raskin of Maryland, Chellie Pingree of Maine, Shri Thanedar of Michigan, Ritchie Torres of New York.
Republican STOCK Act violators this year include Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma and Reps. Dan Meuser of Pennsylvania, Lisa McClain of Michigan, Austin Scott of Georgia, Neal Dunn of Florida, Scott Franklin of Florida, Brandon Gill of Texas and Tim Moore of North Carolina.
Dozens of other members of Congress violated the STOCK Act earlier this decade.
These violations come at a moment when a bipartisan coalition of federal lawmakers are pushing legislation to ban members of Congress and their immediate family members from buying and selling individual stocks at all.
They’ve argued that the current STOCK Act is too weak, particularly its penalties for disclosure violations, which begin at $200 for a first-time offender. The House and Senate ethics committees also reserve the right to waive such fines, and neither committee provides a public accounting of which STOCK Act violators have been fined and how much.
“There’s a commonsense, bipartisan solution on the table that would stop these violations from happening again and again: prohibit members of Congress and their immediate family members from trading stocks while representing the American people,” Jamie Neikrie, legislative director for the government watchdog organization Issue One, told OpenSecrets. “Members have a responsibility to uphold the highest ethical standards, but repeated violations prove the STOCK Act isn’t enough to hold lawmakers accountable. Only a full ban on stock trading will ensure members are serving the public, not their portfolios.”
Dave Levinthal is a Washington, D.C.-based investigative journalist. He served as OpenSecrets’ editorial and communications director from 2009 to 2011.
