Republican Senator Richard Burr, chairman of the powerful US Senate Intelligence Committee, stepped down Thursday after the FBI seized his cellphone in a probe of alleged insider stock trading tied to the coronavirus pandemic.
Burr is under investigation over whether he used his access to highly classified intelligence to sell stocks in February -- before the coronavirus pandemic struck the US, and while Americans were being told the virus's threat was low.
Burr, who receives almost daily briefings from the US intelligence community on threats to the country, wrote in a February 7 opinion piece published on the Fox News website that the US government was "better prepared than ever" for the COVID-19 virus, assuring Americans they were well-protected.
Burr, who receives much of the same intelligence as the White House, clearly had a different private view of the threat than the government's public stance.
BLIND TRUST
Feinstein, a senior member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, has said her investments are held in a blind trust and that stock sales by her husband, a prominent California financier, were unrelated to the pandemic.
