WASHINGTON (States Newsroom) — In a notable break from President Donald Trump’s signature trade policy, several House Republicans joined Democrats in passing a resolution to terminate the president’s national emergency at the northern border that triggered tariffs on Canada just over one year ago.
The measure, passed 219-211, revokes Trump’s Feb. 1, 2025, executive order imposing tariffs on Canada, which he triggered under an unprecedented use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA.
Whether he has the power to invoke tariffs under the 1970s law is under review at the U.S. Supreme Court, which heard arguments in November. An opinion, still not released, has been expected for months.
The House vote occurred less than 24 hours after three House Republicans delivered a rebuke to Trump and joined Democrats in blocking House leadership’s effort to extend a ban on bringing any resolutions to the floor that disapprove of the administration’s tariffs.
Trump’s centerpiece economic policy has drawn criticism over its on-again, off-again changes, causing uncertainty for business and costs passed along to consumers.
The vote also comes just days after Trump threatened to close a new bridge between Windsor, Ontario, and Detroit, Michigan, if Canada does not negotiate a new trade deal with the United States.
In a nearly 300-word post Monday on his platform Truth Social, Trump predicted that if Canada struck a deal with China, the eastern power would “terminate ALL ice Hockey being played in Canada, and permanently eliminate The Stanley Cup.”
‘Canada is our friend’
Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., the resolution’s lead sponsor, criticized Trump’s “manufactured emergency” regarding Canada.
“Canada isn’t a threat. Canada is our friend. Canada is our ally. Canadians have fought alongside Americans, whether it was in World War II or the war in Afghanistan,” Meeks said.
Meeks also said tariffs are costing his constituents up to $1,700 per year.
“That’s what this is about. It’s about American people and making things affordable for them,” Meeks said on the floor ahead of the vote.
Analyses from the Tax Foundation and Yale Budget Lab pin the average cost per household between roughly $1,300 and $1,750 from all current tariffs combined — not just import taxes on products purchased from Canada.
Fentanyl debate
Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla., disagreed, arguing the cost amounted not to lost income but to drug overdose deaths attributed to illicit fentanyl.
“Who will pay the price? It’s a very sad thing to have (been) asked by this colleague of mine … because it’s important to remember, what is this resolution? This resolution ends an emergency related to fentanyl,” Mast said during pre-vote debate.
But U.S. Customs and Border Patrol data from fiscal year 2023 to the present shows fentanyl seizures at the northern border dwarfed by the amount intercepted at the southwest border.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency identifies China as the beginning of the illicit fentanyl supply chain that moves through clandestine labs in Mexico and then into the United States.
Trump’s Feb. 1, 2025 executive order conceded that Border Patrol agents seized “much less fentanyl from Canada than from Mexico last year,” but claimed the amount seized at the northern border in 2024 was still enough to kill 9.5 million people.
The synthetic opioid “is so potent that even a very small parcel of the drug can cause many deaths and destruction to America(n) families,” according to the executive order.
Senate action so far
A handful of Republican senators have also rebuked at least one category of Trump’s emergency tariffs.
In late October, Sens. Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul of Kentucky, along with Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, Maine’s Susan Collins and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, supported a joint resolution in a 52-48 vote to terminate Trump’s 50% tariffs on Brazilian products, including coffee.
The president declared a national emergency and imposed the steep tariff on Brazilian goods on July 30 after accusing Brazil’s government of “politically persecuting” its former far-right President Jair Bolsonaro for plotting a coup to remain in power in 2022.
The Senate vote marked a shift from two earlier efforts in April to stymie Trump’s tariffs, including a measure to terminate the president’s levies on Canadian imports.
