Senator Hawley says President Trump only attacked him in a Truth Social post late Wednesday because multiple GOP senators called the president to tell him that Mr. Hawley’s bill to ban congressional and presidential stock trades would force him to sell his beloved Mar-a-Lago estate. Mr. Hawley tells the Sun that while he doesn’t know who called the president, he knows that it was “senators — plural.”

Mr. Trump lashed out against Mr. Hawley on social media shortly after a Senate committee advanced a bill to ban stock trading by members of Congress, the president, and the vice president. The bill would take effect at the beginning of elected officials’ next terms, so House members would be barred beginning in 2027, the president and vice president would not be affected until 2029, and senators would not be banned from trading until their next terms begin. 

“I don’t think real Republicans want to see their President, who has had unprecedented success, TARGETED, because of the ‘whims’ of a second-tier Senator named Josh Hawley!” Mr. Trump wrote Wednesday. Mr. Hawley joined with all Democrats on the committee to advance the bill over the objections of his Republican colleagues. 

Mr. Hawley on Thursday told reporters that after the committee vote, Republicans in the chamber started reaching out to the president. The Missouri senator and the president spoke later that day, after other senators had spoken to Mr. Trump. 

“What he said is that he had a number of people call him and say that the bill has been changed at the last minute to force him to sell Mar-a-Lago and divest all of his assets,” Mr. Hawley said. “Which is, of course, totally false. It explicitly exempts him.”

“He just said Republican senators called him,” the senator added. Mr. Hawley told reporters that the call ended on a lighthearted note. “He finished by saying: ‘You’re totally exonerated, Josh,’” Mr. Hawley said with a smile. 

Mr. Trump did not discuss specifics about future presidents being barred from trading individual securities. Rather, it was a clarifying discussion for a president whom Mr. Hawley said had been misled by his colleagues. Mr. Hawley said he did not ask the president which lawmakers were calling him, saying only that Mr. Trump told him that it was “senators — plural” who were reaching out. 

“I mean, he wants to ban stock trading” for members of Congress, Mr. Hawley said. “The bottom line here is that the congressional ban is at the core of this. That’s where the ethics issues have been. That’s both sides, so that’s the core of it.”

Mr. Hawley says that the president reaffirmed to him that he wants some kind of ban for public officials, though the two did not get into specifics about exactly who should be regulated or what kinds of assets would be subject to the law. 

“I want to get something the president can sign,” Mr. Hawley said. “The big thing is, he said over and over and over again: ‘I think we need to have a stock trading ban.’”