--- title: "US Senators Accused of Profiting Off Coronavirus Stock Crash" description: "Four U.S. Senators unloaded millions of dollars in stocks after receiving a classified briefing about the coronavirus — saving them from vast losses." date: "2020-03-20" modified: "2020-03-20" authors: - name: "Jon Christian" job_title: "Executive Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/jonc" url: "https://futurism.com/neoscope/us-senators-accused-profiting-coronavirus-stock-crash" categories: - "Developments" - "Health & Medicine" - "Medical" - "Pathogens" - "Viruses" tags: - "coronavirus" - "covid19" - "health" - "politics" --- # US Senators Accused of Profiting Off Coronavirus Stock Crash ![Four U.S. Senators unloaded millions of dollars in stocks after receiving a classified briefing about the coronavirus — saving them from vast losses.]() *\Image: Images via Pixabay/Victor Tangermann\* Four U.S. Senators unloaded millions of dollars in stocks after receiving a classified briefing about the coronavirus in January — saving them from vast losses after the market [later tanked](). The idea of elected officials using secret intel to cash in on a deadly public health crisis is appalling. All four — Georgia Republican Kelly Loeffler, Oklahoma Republican James Inhofe, California Democrat Dianne Feinstein, and North Carolina Republican Richard Burr — are now [facing calls to resign](). *NPR* [reports that]() back on Feb. 27, when the outbreak had only started to go global, Burr attended a private luncheon in DC where he warned other attendees that the situation was grave. "There's one thing that I can tell you about this: It is much more aggressive in its transmission than anything that we have seen in recent history," he said, according to *NPR*. "It is probably more akin to the 1918 pandemic." *ProPublica* [pointed out]() that back in 2012, Burr was one of just three senators to oppose a bill called the STOCK Act, which prevented lawmakers from using privileged information for financial purposes. Even more: On January 22, Burr Tweeted out a sketch of himself and Kelly Loeffer, one of his aforementioned fellow U.S. Senators accused of a post-intel selloff. The sketch was taken during one of the Trump Impeachment hearings. He shared it with this caption: https://twitter.com/SenatorBurr/status/1219989568457531392 ## Author I'm responsible for editing, assigning, and scouting at Futurism, as well as occasionally writing for the site. That work involves keeping an eye on a wide range of narratives and issues, but over the past few years I've become increasingly interested in how AI is shaping the future of media, the web, and information itself. My day-to-day often involves collaborating on reporting and commentary projects bylined by my colleagues, but I try to find time to do my own reporting as well; stories I've broken for Futurism have been cited by publications including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the New Yorker, Wired, Ars Technica, New York Magazine, the Columbia Journalism Review, Bloomberg, and more. I grew up in Southern Vermont and attended Vanderbilt University. Prior to Futurism, I contributed to outlets including the Boston Globe, Vice, Wired, Slate, the Atlantic, the Outline, Ars Technica and more, and did stints in farming and food service. I currently live in Brooklyn, New York, and in my free time I enjoy pinball, word games, cycling, running, and music production. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()