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House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Friday called for an independent ethics probe into Donald Trump's pick to lead the Health and Human Services Department. The Democratic leader said the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE), a non-partisan watchdog group, should examine whether Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.) violated any rules or laws when he traded hundreds of thousands of dollars in health-related stocks while working on healthcare legislation, as reported last month by The Wall Street Journal. Several top Senate Democrats, including Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), called this week for the House Ethics Committee to investigate potential violations surrounding those trades.  (Illis, 1/6)

A marathon of Senate confirmation hearings starting this week will give Democrats the chance to put Donald Trump’s Cabinet nominees on trial even though they have little chance of actually grabbing a scalp or two...[Tom] Price, the House Budget Committee chairman until his nomination, will face questions from Democrats on his trades in health-care stocks while handling legislation that could affect the shares. Watchdog group Public Citizen says he made 630 trades in about 40 companies starting in 2012 while he led the Budget Committee and the Ways and Means Committee’s health panel. (Dennis, 1/9)

Rep. Tom Price, the physician and Georgia Republican tapped for the nation’s leading health care job, has long criticized federal spending as excessive. Yet during his years in Congress, he’s worked hard to keep federal dollars flowing to his most generous campaign donors. (Taylor and Jewett, 1/9)