Eric Schmitt arguably provided more oversight of the Biden administration as Missouri’s attorney general than did the entire previous Congress.

Indeed, by the Associated Press’s count, “Schmitt has filed 25 lawsuits against Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration, challenging policies on COVID-19 vaccinations, climate change, immigration and education” and more.

That’s a prime candidate for the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee by any measure.

His fellow Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley wishes mightily Schmitt’s tenacity could be put to use on the committee, which Hawley already sits on – not just for the country’ sake  but for the state’s. But the Republican caucus this week honored the usual protocol of not having two senators from the same state on a committee.

Hawley is undeterred.

“Well, I voted for it. I’d love to have him on the Judiciary Committee,” Hawley told The Heartlander. “I’m excited to have him as a colleague. My colleagues did not vote for it, however, and so unfortunately, we won’t have the chance to serve together on that committee. 

“But listen, he is an incredibly talented guy and he’s going to be a great senator for the state of Missouri. I don’t know what committees he’ll be on, but wherever he is I know he’s going to make a big impact, and I can’t wait to work with him.”

Asked if Schmitt’s presence on Judiciary could help put a check on the far left in and out of government, Hawley says Schmitt can do just that from other perches in the Senate.

“Anytime you can get a former prosecutor, former attorney general on the panel, and of course knowing him personally and his background – I would have loved to have him. But I think his influence in the Senate is not tied to any one committee. I think he’s going to be tremendous for the state of Missouri no matter where he is.”

Hawley, also a former Missouri attorney general, is trying to do the same, on a number of issues. He recently announced a bill to ban the Chinese social media platform Tik Tok nationwide, after his bill to prohibit its use on federal devices was signed into law last year. He’s also reintroduced a bill to ban stock trading by members of Congress.

Hawley’s new stock trading bill is called the Preventing Elected Leaders from Owning Securities and Investments act – which pointedly spells out the name PELOSI.

The bill comes just as news surfaced that Pelosi’s husband Paul fortuitously sold 30,000 shares of Google stock just weeks before an antitrust lawsuit was filed against the company by the Department of Justice.

Pelosi’s trades involved between $1.5 million and $3 million in assets.

Could it have been insider trading?

“Well, I tell you what, it’s awfully suspicious,” Hawley says. “But listen: Even if it wasn’t technically insider trading, she has a history of benefiting from, let’s just say, perfectly timed stock trades going back years. I mean, she’s gotten rich off of it. She was rich to begin with, but she’s gotten more rich off of it. 

“And I just think the American people, certainly Missourians, expect better than this. They think that when you send people up to Washington, they’re not there day-trading, focusing on their stock portfolio. They’re there working for you. And so the easy answer is, ban these politicians from owning the stock. 

“Politicians want to save? Great. You can buy broad-based mutual funds. That’s what most Americans do. But having this individual stock trading – Pelosi is the poster child for why this should not be permitted.”

As for Tik Tok, Hawley cautioned Missourians to avoid it all together, since its vast collection of user data is grist for the malevolent Chinese Communist Party.

“Here’s the problem,” Hawley says. “If your kids got TikTok on their phone or you’ve got it on yours, it is tracking your emails, it is looking at your photographs, it is reading your contact list – and you cannot stop it. And it is making all of that information – your information or your kids’ – available to the Chinese Communist Party in Beijing. That’s a problem. 

“As a father of three, I can tell you I don’t want the Chinese Communist Party building a dossier on my kids or tracking my kids around the web. And that’s why my kids aren’t on TikTok, to be honest with you.  

“But a parent doesn’t have the ability to control this, and you can’t go in and turn it off. So, the answer here is to ban this – stop China from using this as a back door (into Americans’ lives), and then let other companies create competing platforms.”