Senator Dumped Up to $1.7 Million of Stock After Reassuring Public About Coronavirus Preparedness

CORONAVIRUSby Robert Faturechi and Derek Willis March 19, 5:01 p.m. EDT

Intelligence Chair Richard Burr’s selloff came around the time he was receiving daily briefings on the health threat.. Richard Burr, R-N.C., reassured the public about coronavirus preparedness and then soon dumped stocks. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they’re published.Soon after he offered public assurances that the government was ready to battle the coronavirus, the powerful chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Richard Burr, sold off a significant percentage of his stocks, unloading between $628,000 and $1.72 million of his holdings on Feb. 13 in 33 separate transactions.As the head of the intelligence committee, Burr, a North Carolina Republican, has access to the government’s most highly classified information about threats to America’s security. His committee was receiving daily coronavirus briefings around this time, according to a Reuters story.A week after Burr’s sales, the stock market began a sharp decline and has lost about 30% since.On Thursday, Burr came under fire after NPR obtained a secret recording from Feb. 27, in which the lawmaker gave a VIP group at an exclusive social club a much more dire preview of the economic impact of the coronavirus than what he had told the public.