Chris Collins: Indicted Republican resigns day before pleading guilty to felony insider trading

The New York Republican is the first House member to have endorsed Donald Trump in the 2016 election

A House Republican has resigned from his seat the day before he was reportedly set to file a guilty plea over felony charges of insider trading, according to reports.

Christopher Collins, who has served in the US House of Representatives since 2013, was said to have resigned on Monday afternoon and sent his notice to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The 69-year-old politician has been accused of illegally trading on material non-public information, according to federal prosecutors. Reports indicated he was set to change his non-guilty plea during a court appearance later in the week.

Mr Collins was the first congressman to endorse Donald Trump for the presidency in 2016.

In a bizarre twist, the second congressman to endorse Mr Trump was also indicted along with his wife on charges the two improperly used his campaign funding for personal expenses, including vacations, shopping and their children’s school tuitions.

Both men threw their support behind Mr Trump in February 2016, at a time when much of Washington was busy endorsing establishment candidates like Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio and others.

A federal judge scheduled a hearing for Mr Collins to enter a guilty plea to unspecified charges in the case on Tuesday afternoon. A similar hearing was also scheduled for the congressman’s son, Cameron Collins.

Mr Collins had been scheduled to go to trial next year on charges of conspiracy, securities fraud, wire fraud and making false statements to the FBI.

Prosecutors accused him of sharing non-public information from a biopharmaceutical company with his son, allowing Cameron Collins and another man to avoid nearly $800,000 (£650,380) in stock losses.

The case, filed in August 2018, initially caused Mr Collins to drop a re-election bid, but he restarted his campaign a month later as Republican leaders were deliberating who would replace him on the ballot.

At the time he said the "stakes are too high to allow the radical left to take control of this seat in Congress”.

The most serious charge the politician faces carries a potential prison term of up to 20 years.

According to the indictment, Mr Collins was attending the Congressional Picnic at the White House on 22 June, 2017, when he received an email from the company's chief executive saying that a trial of a drug the company developed to treat multiple sclerosis was a clinical failure.

Mr Collins responded to the email saying: "Wow. Makes no sense. How are these results even possible???" the indictment said.

It said he then called his son, Cameron Collins, and, after several missed calls, they spoke for more than six minutes.

The next morning, according to the indictment, Cameron Collins began selling his shares, unloading enough over a two-day period to avoid $570,900 (£464,073) in losses before a public announcement of the drug trial results.

After the announcement, the company's stock price plunged 92%. Cameron Collins is accused of passing along the information to his fiancee's father, so he could also dump his stock.

Additional reporting by AP