U.S. Senator Susan Collins speaks with Senator Lisa Murkowski at a confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, on Feb. 19.Kent Nishimura/Reuters
A Democrat-led Senate resolution to undercut Donald Trump’s tariffs on Canada has enraged the U.S. President, who lashed out repeatedly at a handful of Republicans for supporting the attempt.
But among Republicans outside of Washington, the prospect of sweeping tariffs against their country’s most important trading partners has begun to raise worry that Mr. Trump, if he is not careful, could not merely damage the U.S. economy but destroy their party’s future grip on power.
If Mr. Trump ”is truly pushing tariffs for their own sake, and plans to go with this long term, I think it jeopardizes, honestly, all the good he’s done in his presidency,” said Matt Rinaldi, a senior Republican in Texas who has chaired that state’s party apparatus.
If the U.S. economy under Mr. Trump struggles because of long-term tariffs, Mr. Rinaldi said, that will help ensure a Democratic victory in the next presidential election.
He does not believe Mr. Trump intends to keep trade measures permanently in place. Instead, he sees them as a negotiating tactic intended to drive down barriers to the movement of U.S. goods into Canada and other countries.
For now, conservatives in the U.S. are giving Mr. Trump “the benefit of the doubt that this is exerting leverage on Canada to get a better free trade deal between both of the countries,” he said. But, he acknowledged, “everybody is in wait and see mode.”
Mr. Rinaldi’s worries about the consequences of lasting tariffs reflect a broader concern about the consequences of Mr. Trump’s dedication to remaking the U.S. economy through the widespread imposition of taxes on foreign-made goods.
The U.S. President and some of his key economic lieutenants, including Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, have described the formation of an External Revenue Service that would amass sufficient resources from levies on foreign goods and that could offset American income tax obligations.
Mr. Trump has called April 2, the day he unveiled wide-reaching reciprocal tariffs, “Liberation Day.”
But there are tangible signs of unease building inside Mr. Trump’s party over the President’s agenda. Thirty-one states count Canada as their biggest export market. Five of them are among the seven swing states that helped return Mr. Trump to the White House.
This week, several Republicans have voiced support for a Democrat-backed Senate resolution that seeks to halt some of the tariffs on Canadian goods.
On social media on Wednesday, Mr. Trump attacked four Republicans – Mitch McConnell, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins and Rand Paul – accusing them of “playing with the lives of the American people, and right into the hands of the Radical Left Democrats and Drug Cartels.” A vote on the resolution was expected Wednesday evening.
The President’s response underscored the risk in so publicly opposing his agenda, particularly at a moment on Wednesday when the White House was finalizing decisions on which level of tariffs to impose on which countries.
“I suspect the President doesn’t like to see his authority challenged or limited – and probably will react in a negative way about it,” said Everett Eissenstat, a trade expert who was deputy director of the National Economic Council during Mr. Trump’s first administration.
But signs of Republican opposition to tariffs suggest a way forward for Canada, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said Wednesday.
“It is clear American public opinion, industry and U.S. leaders are increasingly opposing a continued trade dispute with Canada,” she said in a statement.
“Creating political pressure from within the U.S. to change course on Canadian tariffs will accomplish far more than any other action we can take as a country.”
Among those making that argument Wednesday was Ms. Collins, a Republican Senator from Maine. If the 25-per-cent tariffs on Canadian goods go into effect, it will “be so harmful,” she said, speaking on the Senate floor.
“And as price hikes always do, they will hurt those the most who can afford them the least.”
Democratic leaders have called Mr. Trump’s planned tariffs a historic tax hike for American consumers, citing economic forecasts that blanket levies will raise costs by thousands of dollars for the average household.
The President’s numerous tariff plans – and his whipsaw approach to imposing some, while suspending others – has brought “mass confusion” in places such as Maine, said Phillip Harriman, a former state senator there.
Mr. Trump has accused other countries of taking advantage of the U.S. But “the President has got to be a little bit more specific about where is the imbalance and what is the tariff going to do to create a level playing field for American workers?” Mr. Harriman said.
He hopes U.S. tariffs result in other countries quickly responding by lowering their barriers to the movement of goods rather than in long-lasting trade obstacles built around the U.S. economy: “Hopefully, they would be adjusted by mutual consent to go downward.”
His views reflect what Canadian industry delegations have heard recently in Washington.
For Dennis Darby, president of Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters, who met over the past month with Congressional representatives, “ almost everyone we spoke to, on both sides of the aisle in both houses, were very much supportive of Canada. We got no real pushback from anybody saying, ‘oh, Canada is a bad trader,’ or ‘Canada is abusing the trade agreement.‘”
That may not be enough to keep Mr. Trump from imposing tariffs. But, Mr. Darby said, it may help to keep them from remaining in place.
Canadian business and political leaders have for months made the case that with tariffs, “things are going to cost them more, that supply chains are going to be disrupted and in some cases they will have slowdowns in production, which means layoffs as well,” he said.
“The more Americans share that message, the bigger the chance that these tariffs won’t be sustained.”