Republicans gently push back on tariffs
Senators take ‘baby step’ but many remain wary of challenging president
WASHINGTON, D.C.— Republicans have made a gentle, symbolic move toward reining in President Donald Trump on tariffs. But it’s unclear whether they’re willing to go any further than that.
The Republican-controlled Senate voted 88 to 11 on Wednesday to pass a non-binding motion in favour of giving Congress “a role” in deciding on tariffs imposed under a “national security” provision of trade law.
Trump used the national security provision to impose his tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum, without consulting Congress, and he is threatening to use it again to impose tariffs on cars imported from Canada.
It is rare for Republicans to take even the mildest of formal steps in opposition to Trump. The vote demonstrates the unhappiness of most congressional Republicans, who continue to favour free trade, with Trump’s protectionist tactics.
“This is a baby step in a good direction,” said Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker, who put forward the motion.
But many of his colleagues want to stop there. Congressional Republicans are wary of taking any substantive action against a president overwhelm- ingly popular with party voters.
On Thursday, House Speaker Paul Ryan gave a speech decrying the tariffs — then told reporters he would not support House legislation to try to stop the tariffs.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has not been willing to schedule a vote on a bill from Corker that would give Congress a vote not only on future “Section 232” tariffs but on all such tariffs going back two years, which would include the steel and aluminum tariffs on Canada.
Corker had previously attempted to schedule a Senate vote on the bill by attaching it to another legislative matter. But he was denied consent by Ohio Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, who supports Trump’s steel and aluminum tariffs.
Corker’s motion simply asked members of a committee to grant Congress an unspecified role in determining the national security tariffs. The committee is free to ignore the request.
All 11 votes against the symbolic motion were from Republicans. One of the party members who voted in favour, North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, said he would not vote in favour of legislation saying the same thing, the Weekly Standard reported, because he does not want to limit Trump in negotiations.
Paul Ryan made a similar remark on Wednesday, saying, “I don’t want to hamstring the president’s negotiating tactics.”
The motion is unlikely to do much to stop Trump from imposing his threatened auto tariffs, though it “does suggest a certain growing concern” among Trump-supporting Republicans in Congress, said Eric Miller, president of the Rideau Potomac Strategy Group, a U.S.Canada consultancy.
“I just don’t see the numbers there to challenge the president’s trade policy in a funda- mental way,” Miller said. “But it is what you could say, in the market sense, a ‘leading indicator’ of the Congress being unwilling to necessarily accept the president’s will on trade in perpetuity in the future if it doesn’t go well.”
Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake called the vote on the motion “a rebuke of the president’s abuse of trade authority.” Before the vote, he gave a Senate speech hailing Canada.
He concluded: “Canada has been our ally, our partner and our friend. And now they’re told that their steel and aluminum exports to us represent a national security threat. That is an abuse of Section 232 of the trade act. I’m so glad that Congress is finally, finally pushing back on this.”