Senator Mike Rounds (R-SD) holds powerful committee seats (Armed Services, Banking, Appropriations, Intelligence), and his financial profile centers on South Dakota farms, a private Midwestern hotel investment club, and a family-associated equipment LLC rather than active public-stock trading. His most concrete accountability flag is a STOCK Act late-filing violation: he disclosed a $1M-$5M sale of nonpublic Aeronics stock more than five months late in May 2026, which his office attributed to a third-party investment firm. He also shows an above-median missed-vote rate (8.3% over his tenure) alongside ongoing six-figure fundraising. No sourced evidence was found of campaign-fund personal use or family lobbying/revolving-door arrangements, and no documented quid-pro-quo links donor money to his votes — so those areas are scored as insufficient-data or correlation-only rather than as findings.
Public record
In Congress since
2015
Committees
Appropriations Armed Services Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Indian Affairs Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
Missed votes, 119th Congress
0.9% (8 of 915; median member 1.9%)
Campaign money, 2025–26 cycle
$3.2M raised · 44% from PACs & committees · $2.7M cash on hand FEC ↗
The stock-trading ban
Senate cloture on H.R. 7008, Sep 30, 2026
Yes
Cosponsored a ban bill
None
H.R. 7008 bans new stock purchases by members, spouses and dependents; it doesn't force sales of existing holdings. The Senate vote was on the version paired with the SAVE Act, which is why no Democrat voted yes. Full breakdown →
Amounts are the ranges members must report, not exact values. The STOCK Act requires a report within 45 days of a trade; "late" counts days past that deadline, measured to the filing date.
How the score breaks down
Stock self-trading
25% weight
18
Rounds' disclosed financial activity is dominated by farms, a private hotel investment club (Bird Dog Equity Partners, part-owner of 10 hotels), and a privately held equipment LLC (Aeronics Inc.) he is associated with — not active individual public-stock trading. Quiver references up to ~$26.5M of parsed transactions, but holdings appear largely fund/private-entity based with trades executed by third-party managers. He was 5+ months late disclosing a $1M-$5M sale of nonpublic Aeronics stock (filed May 2026), a STOCK Act late-filing violation; his office said the sale was made by a third-party firm without his direct involvement and did not confirm whether the $200 fine was paid. Score reflects the disclosure violation and trade volume, tempered by the absence of evidence of active individual public-stock trading with committee-sector timing.
Rounds' 2023 disclosure shows assets in a $3.24M-$12.2M range; Quiver estimates ~$9.3M as of Feb 2026. Much of his wealth (farms, hotel investment club, family equipment LLC) appears to predate or be independent of office, and no reliable year-by-year tenure baseline was obtainable to isolate growth beyond salary/market. No evidence of anomalous enrichment; scored 0 for lack of attributable data rather than as a finding.
Money → action alignmentcorrelation, not proof of any quid-pro-quo
20% weight
35
CORRELATION, NOT PROOF. Rounds sits on powerful committees — Armed Services, Banking/Housing (chairs the Securities, Insurance & Investment Subcommittee), Appropriations, and Intelligence — sectors (defense, finance/securities/insurance, banking) that are typically major Senate donor industries. His campaign receives finance, insurance, and defense-aligned contributions consistent with these assignments. No specific quid-pro-quo or documented vote-for-dollars link was established in available sources, and detailed OpenSecrets industry tables were not retrievable (403). Score reflects committee-sector overlap with likely donor concentration only.
No sourced evidence found of campaign or leadership-PAC funds spent on personal benefit. (A 2014-era controversy over a state loan to Northern Beef Packers dates to his governorship and involved state, not campaign, funds.) Scored 0 for absence of data, not as a clean-record penalty.
No sourced evidence found of family members lobbying tied to his office, office-linked contracts to relatives, or a documented staff-to-lobbyist pipeline. Scored 0 for absence of data.
From Jan 2015 to May 2026, Rounds missed 350 of 4,238 roll-call votes (8.3%), well above the ~2.8% median for sitting senators. He continues active fundraising, disclosing tranches such as $342.1K and $413.1K in recent filings. The elevated missed-vote rate combined with ongoing fundraising supports a moderate score, though no evidence ties specific missed votes to fundraising events or paid speeches.
Sources behind this score: 1 news reporting · 3 data aggregator · 2 official record · 3 reference database. Score = weighted average of the components that have data; the 3 without sourced evidence are excluded, never counted against the member. Methodology →
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