‘Is Trump's inner circle illegally profiting off?’: US Senator alleges insider trading after tariff pause

Democratic Senator Adam Schiff on Thursday alleged that the White House is engaged in “insider trading” hours after US President Donald Trump ‘paused’ the implementation of tariffs on most countries.

Hours after the high-stakes drama of raising duties on China and calling off tariffs for 90 days, a move that revived the stock market globally, Schiff said, “Is Donald Trump’s inner circle illegally profiting off of these huge swings in the stock market by insider trading?”

The Senator referred to one of Trump’s posts on TruthSocial earlier on Wednesday, where he said “this is a good time to buy”, suggesting that people might have known about the president’s plan to lift tariffs.

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Is Donald Trump's inner circle illegally profiting off of these huge swings in the stock market by insider trading?

Congress must find out. pic.twitter.com/ZZGX99PtFE

— Adam Schiff (@SenAdamSchiff) April 9, 2025

“The question is between that tweet and Donald Trump’s announcement that he was reducing the tariffs on most other nations apart from China, who knew what the President was going to do? And did people around the President trade stock, knowing the incredible gyration the market was about to go through?” Schiff said.

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Expressing concern over the involvement of Trump’s family members in official business, Schiff said, “This is a President who is trading in his own meme coin even as he’s president. His kids are trading in their own cryptocurrency. You’ve got people like Elon Musk who are doing their own conflicted self dealing in the administration.”

Markets have been on a rollercoaster ride since Trump imposed a 10-percent baseline tariff on all countries and higher rates on key trading partners that he accused of cheating the United States, which activated on Wednesday.

But as markets swayed yet again, Trump said in a surprise announcement that he had authorised a 90 day pause on the higher tariffs – although the baseline 10-percent rate remains.

Schiff demanded a thorough investigation into the matter and said, “We in Congress need to do more than demand answers. We need to do the oversight necessary to get those answers.”

With inputs from agencies