April 2 (UPI) — The U.S. Senate on Wednesday night rebuked President Donald Trump‘s worldwide tariffs announced earlier in the day with four Republicans joining all Democrats.
The Senate adopted a resolution 51-48 aimed at blocking the Trump administration’s proposed tariffs on Canadian imports. Republican Sen. Roger Marshall, of Kansas, didn’t vote.
The four Republicans who voted with Democrats were: Rand Paul, of Kentucky, who cosponsored the resolution, along with Susan Collins of Maine, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.
“The Maine economy is integrated with Canada, our most important trading partner,” Collins said on the Senate floor. “From home heating oil, gasoline, jet fuel, and other refined petroleum products, to Maine’s paper mills, forest products businesses, agricultural producers, and lobstermen, the tariffs on Canada would be detrimental to many Maine families and our local economies.”
Republicans hold a 53-47 edge in the Senate.
The GOP majority House is not expected to take up any efforts to rebuke Trump.
Rep. Greg Meeks of New York, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said Wednesday that he plans to introduce a privileged resolution to force a House vote over tariffs. It’s a procedural to bypass leadership and force floor votes.
Kaine authored the resolution.
“There’s never been a one-sided trade war and they always retaliate when it’s agriculture. It hits ag states very, very hard, which includes whiskey,” Kaine said. “Craft distillers in Virginia, my craft brewers are very, very worried about this.”
Kentucky, which has $9 billion bourbon industry, or 95% of the world share, is facing boycotts and retaliatory tariffs from Canada.
“Tariffs on Canada will threaten us with a recession. I mean, it’s a terrible, terrible idea,” Paul told reporters Wednesday.
His Kentucky counterpart, McConnell, warned that “tariffs make it more expensive to do business in America, driving up costs for producers and consumers across the board.
He noted there are nearly 70,000 Kentucky family farms that sell crops around the world.
Trump urged Republicans to vote against the measure in a post on Truth Social, naming the four Senate Republicans who later voted un favor of the resolution.
“Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, and Rand Paul, also of Kentucky, will hopefully get on the Republican bandwagon, for a change,” Trump wrote.