Rand Paul has had quite a week. His anti-COVID-vaccine and misinformation-loving stance got him suspended from YouTube. Not to be deterred, he then tweeted a deranged rant about freedom and resisting mask mandates, which led one of his state’s leading newspapers to wonder, “Is Sen. Rand Paul okay?” All of his clashes with Dr. Fauci and skepticism about the dangers of COVID then came back to bite him in the butt when he disclosed — 16 months after the fact — that his wife had purchased stock in a biotech company (Gilead) that manufactured the COVID-treatment drug Remdesivir.
The 16-month delay certainly didn’t meet requirements of the Stock Act (a 45-day deadline), and Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez mercilessly shaded him while arguing that Congress members shouldn’t be allowed to privately own stock at all (because stuff like this tends to happen). Subsequently, the Lexington CBS affiliate caught up with Rand and captured his excuse (via Mediaite): “I typed it into the computer and I thought I pressed send.” Yup, Rand really said that. Here’s more from Mediaite:
“I apologize. I was bad on the reporting,” Paul told reporters while visiting Somerset small business Baxter’s Coffee with his wife.
“I had typed it into the computer. So, about two weeks after Kelley made the stock purchase, I typed it into the computer and I thought I pressed send but I didn’t.”
Rand Paul, physician and elected official, claims that he simply forgot to hit “send” while making what he said was an intended stock-purchase disclosure, well before the Stock Act deadline. That’s not too believable at all.
(Via Mediaite)