A Republican looking to run against Rep. Tom Suozzi unloaded on the increasingly wealthy congressman with a sarcastic “Savant” honor for seeing his investment portfolio skyrocket 450%.
GOP hopeful Greg Hach said Suozzi should earn a special title because his $2.8 million fortune has ballooned to nearly $13 million during his seven years in the House of Representatives.
“It’s miraculous. Truly. That’s a 450% leap!,” Hach said, saying his investments have outperformed billionaire investor Warren Buffett over the same stretch.
“With that rate of return, Taxman Tom could halve the federal deficit in a decade. Just remarkable!.”
Suozzi’s 2024 financial disclosure report filed in May shows he has investments in commercial real estate, a bio-start-up company, a Southampton Country Day Camp, treasury bills, a Merrill Lynch discretionary tax deferred account — and a Suozzi Family Trust.
Hach — an Air Force veteran and lawyer seeking to run against Suozzi in next year’s election — sarcastically said “our financial prayers have been answered.”
“We all know that Mr. Suozzi would never use insider knowledge from his position in Congress. That would be ghastly,” Hach quipped. “Mr. Suozzi is simply the Mozart of mutual funds, the Shakespeare of shares, the Einstein of equities. It’s only logical that he should be named ‘U.S. Stock Savant.’”
Suozzi has come under fire in the past for not filing stock transactions and other investments in a timely manner, in violation of the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act, or STOCK Act.
Under current public disclosure rules set by the STOCK Act, members of Congress are required to disclose financial transactions in excess of $1,000 within a month and are prohibited from taking longer than 45 days to do so.
Hach mockingly said Suozzi should share his stock-picking genius with the next generation — teenagers in House District 3, which covers communities in Nassau County and Queen
“With results like his, it would be negligent not to get him into the classroom,” Hach said.
“Kids need algebra, sure, but they also need to learn the difference between ordinary investing and whatever witchcraft Taxman Tom’s conjuring.”
Hach said he keeps his investments in a blind trust and he’ll continue to do so if elected.
A Suozzi campaign rep ripped Hach’s obsession with the congressman’s investment portfolio.
“Voters are sick of political games,” Suozzi’s senior campaign adviser Kim Devlin said. “An inaccurate and uninformed reading of public disclosure reports won’t distract from Congressman Suozzi’s focus on bipartisan legislation to make health care less expensive, to fix immigration and the border, and to make things more affordable,”
She also said Suozzi supports “bipartisan legislation making its way through Congress right now to ban members of Congress from owning individual stocks.”
Suozzi, a former Nassau County executive, served in Congress from 2017 to 2022 but gave up his House seat and ran for governor in 2022, losing in the Democratic Party primary to Gov. Kathy Hochul.
He reclaimed his former seat last year in a special election after convicted ex-Rep. George Santos (R) got the boot. He then won election again in November, narrowly defeating former Long Island Assemblyman Michael Li Petri.
Last week, Hach ripped Suozzi for proposing a federal income tax hike for earners making more than $400,000, giving him the nickname “Taxman Tom.”
