WASHINGTON, D.C. — Politicians in conservative states most affected by U.S. tariffs on Canadian goods — and Ottawa’s targeted retaliatory tariffs against key sectors in Republican strongholds — are increasingly concerned over the economic fallout from Donald Trump’s trade agenda, especially with the 2026 midterm elections looming.
Last Friday, Trump imposed a 35 per cent tariff on Canadian goods not compliant with the Canada-US-Mexico Agreement, adding to existing high duties on steel, aluminum, autos, and copper. Though most Canada-U.S. trade remains USMCA-compliant, businesses dealing in affected goods had largely been waiting to see if tariffs would be lifted. Now, those industries must pass increased costs along to U.S. buyers, pushing prices higher on items ranging from groceries and clothing to cars and farm equipment.
Combined with last Friday’s weak U.S. jobs report, the trade concerns have GOP lawmakers worried about the political and economic impact ahead of the midterms, but only a handful dare to voice their concerns.
“It definitely is indicative of a weakened economy, an economy that’s not acting in a robust fashion. I’ve all along felt like there’s a lag between tariffs and actual economic downturn,” Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, a Republican, told the press this week, adding that retailers have told him they think they will have to raise prices this fall.
Kansas Sen. Jerry Moran also warned this week of rising costs for consumers and businesses. While noting that tariffs can be good for solving trade barriers, he said “there’s no question tariffs are a tax on the cost of a product.” He also noted that trade uncertainty is bad for business because it “delays decisions to expand, to hire, to spend money.”
Earlier this year, Mitch McConnell, a Republican senator from Kentucky, also railed against Trump’s tariffs.
“With so much at stake globally, the last thing we need is to pick fights with the very friends with whom we should be working with to protect against China’s predatory and unfair trade practices,” he said in a statement. He and Sen. Paul, along with Sen. Susan Collins, of Maine, and Sen. Lisa Murkowski, of Alaska, also voted in favour of a resolution to undo Trump’s 25 per cent tariffs back in the spring, warning of impacts on their state economies and border communities. The Senate narrowly approved the joint resolution, 51-48, but it then died in the House.
Inu Manak, a fellow for trade policy at the Council on Foreign Relations, says inflated prices from the tariffs will be felt before the end of the year — and for some items, like clothing, as early as next month with back-to-school shopping. And while Republicans know these impacts are looming, they’re not taking steps to mitigate the tariffs.
“What we are starting to see,” she says, “is that when they go back home to their constituencies on the weekends, they’re getting a lot of questions and pushback on the tariffs themselves.”
Earlier this year, questions from voters during town hall meetings related mostly to the DOGE firings, Manak explains, but now tariffs are top of mind. Apart from the five senators mentioned above, however, these local chats are not being amplified by the majority of Republican lawmakers back in Washington.
“Republicans are in a weird position right now because, on the one hand, they’re trying to sell the president’s signature economic policy, the ‘Big Beautiful Bill,’ which is huge tax cuts,” Manak says. Tariff revenue is meant to help pay for those tax cuts, “so they’re having to sell this bill and also defend the tariffs, neither of which are popular right now.”
Polling has shown that the majority of Americans — and the vast majority of Democrats — oppose the tariffs.
So why are Republican lawmakers muted on an issue that’s so concerning to their constituents? Clark Packard, a research fellow in the Cato Institute’s Herbert A. Stiefel Center for Trade Policy Studies, points to the “shadow of Trumpism” and says few will risk drawing the ire of the president and his allies.
Manak agrees. She says it’s unlikely that more Republican voices will push back on tariffs before the midterms. “I just think that they’re not willing to oppose the president, and they’re very concerned about being primaried” and losing seats if Trump works against them, she says.
Privately, however, they are saying plenty. Manak says she has spoken with Republicans who are concerned about the economic impact on their states and on certain industries being affected. “But they can’t really do anything at this point,” she adds.
Many lawmakers likely hope they won’t have to wait for the midterms for a reckoning. Last week, the Washington, D.C.-based Federal Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments in challenges to Trump’s use of IEEPA, and a decision could come as early as this month over the legality of the tariffs. Packard suggests that many Republicans are “quietly hoping that a court will strike down the tariffs.”
A source close to the U.S.-Canada trade negotiations, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said they’ve had conversations with those in Congress who are concerned by the tariffs. They are “literally sitting back and hoping that the courts do their job for them so they don’t have to deal with this,” the source said.
Barring a legal solution, it will be left to the voters to weigh in on Trump’s tariffs. At the moment, economists are predicting slower growth, but few are talking about a recession in the coming year, despite the lower-than-expected employment report. But “if that continues, if inflation ticks up, which it looks like it’s potentially starting to do, then I think voters will punish the incumbents,” says Manak.
Today, Republicans hold the majority in the U.S. Senate, with 53 of the 100 seats, and a slim majority in the House with 219 of 435 seats. Twenty-two Senate seats are up for grabs next year, and while the Democrats only need to gain four seats to take control, most of the races are in states that went for Trump in 2024. As for the House, some experts say the Dems are likely to flip the chamber.
“Polling suggests that people aren’t so optimistic,” says Manak. “If that continues, I do think there’s a very solid chance that there will be some seat changes — barring some gerrymandering,” particularly in Texas.
Drawing a parallel to Trump’s first term, Manak points out that the president’s first midterms saw the House flip, “because of a lot of targeted retaliations, from China in particular.”
The president could still turn things around, says Packard. “If [Trump] can get some deals done, that’s a positive for him, giving certainty to the economy.” He suggests that this would need to include a baseline tariff lower than 15 per cent.
But Packard mostly sees trouble ahead for the Republicans.
“The president himself is deeply unpopular with the American public,” he says. If his agenda and the tariffs stay in place as they are now, “the president will become less popular, the policy will become less popular, and Republicans therefore will become less popular and there will be substantial pushback.”
“I can absolutely see the House flipping,” he adds.
National Post
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