The Scoop
One of House Republicans’ most vulnerable incumbents — already under scrutiny for his prolific trades after he campaigned against letting lawmakers buy or sell stocks — is about to face a six-figure ad campaign slamming him for doing just that.
The Natural Resources Defense Council Action Fund is starting to spend early against Rep. Rob Bresnahan, R-Pa., with new broadcast and digital ads that were shared first with Semafor.
The ads detail how Bresnahan sold clean energy stocks and purchased fossil fuel ones days before he voted for the GOP’s recent megabill, which reversed course on clean-energy tax breaks and directed more federal leasing for oil and gas drilling.
It’s unlikely to be the last stocks-themed Democratic attack on Bresnahan, whose purple district is a top target for the opposition headed into the midterms. The wealthy executive has become one of Congress’ most active traders after writing in an editorial before his election that stock trading by members of Congress “needs to come to an end immediately.”
“This isn’t just about the remarkably convenient timing of his stock trades,” Christy Goldfuss, executive director of the NRDC Action Fund, said in a statement. “It’s about his lack of care for people he represents who will pay more while their congressman enriches himself.”
An analysis conducted by NRDC Action Fund using Quiver Quantitative, which scrapes data on stock trades, found that Bresnahan made 81 trades worth at least $200,000 — and as much as $1.45 million — in the 10 days between the release of the House’s megabill text and the chamber’s first floor vote.
Only Reps. Jefferson Shreve, R-Ind., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif., traded more than Bresnahan during that time period, according to Quiver. Bresnahan has so far made 598 trades in 2025, per the analysis; only Khanna traded more.
“Bresnahan has always advocated for an all-of-the-above energy approach that meets the needs of both the growing national economy and his district,” a spokesperson for Bresnahan, Hannah Pope, said in a statement. “He does not trade his own stocks. His focus is on serving the working families of Northeastern Pennsylvania.”
Bresnahan, who signed onto multiple efforts warning against phasing out the clean-energy tax breaks, has previously said the trading is conducted by his financial advisers.
He told WVIA News last month that he’s concerned telling them to stop will cause him to “go broke” — and while he’d like to form a blind trust, the House “ethics process” has stopped him from doing so.
Know More
NRDC Action Fund is spending $150,000 on the campaign for now but may add to that later. Democratic strategists told Semafor they expect forthcoming paid media to follow a similar line of attack.
“He has broken the trust of voters and proven over and over again that he only cares about his own wealth — and that’s exactly why he’ll be a one-term member of Congress,” Eli Cousin, a spokesperson for House Democrats’ campaign arm, said in a statement.
Republicans are already worried about keeping Bresnahan’s seat. Both Vice President JD Vance and House Republican Conference Chair Lisa McClain made his district one of their first stops in promoting President Donald Trump’s megabill.
Whether his stock trading will indeed move the needle in 2026, however, remains to be seen. Proposals to ban stock trading by lawmakers are widely popular with voters — but that hasn’t been enough to propel them across the finish line, raising questions over how politically potent the issue is.
Since the STOCK Act of 2012 made it harder for members of Congress to trade on inside information, lawmakers’ portfolios have on average rarely outperformed the market.
A Senate committee recently approved a bill that would further restrict stock trading by elected officials, and House members are pushing for a floor vote on similar legislation. Bresnahan himself has introduced legislation that would ban members of Congress and their spouses from trading stocks starting in 2027.
Still, Republican leaders have yet to commit to bringing such a proposal to the floor, even as Trump says he supports the idea “conceptually.”
Notable
- The New York Times reported in April on how Bresnahan’s stock trading deviated from his campaign trail promises.