A bipartisan measure repealing President Donald Trump’s tariffs against Canada passed the House on Wednesday, a significant step by Congress to rebuke a key part of the commander in chief’s economic agenda.
In a 219-211 vote, the House moved to end the national emergency Trump declared on America’s northern neighbor last year. The emergency declaration allowed the president to impose tariffs on Canadian goods and imports. Six Republicans joined nearly all Democrats to back the measure. One Democrat, Rep. Jared Golden (D-ME), voted against repealing the emergency.
The vote comes after the House failed to re-up a ban on legislation to repeal the president’s tariffs from coming to the House floor for a vote. GOP leadership attempted to extend the ban through a party-line vote on Tuesday night, but that failed after three Republicans joined Democrats to defeat it.
In a Truth Social post Wednesday evening, Trump threatened that any Republicans who voted against tariffs would “seriously suffer the consequences come Election time, and that includes Primaries!”
The president declared a national emergency in February 2025 and imposed a 25% additional tariff on imports from Canada and Mexico, as well as a 10% additional tariff on China.
The president increased tariffs on select Canadian goods from 25% to 35% in July 2025, citing a public health crisis due to the flow of fentanyl across the northern border. In October of that year, Trump announced he would further increase the tariff rate on Canada after one of its provinces, Ontario, launched an anti-tariff commercial invoking former President Ronald Reagan.
Democrats had filed a resolution to repeal the tariffs under the emergency shortly after they went into effect, but GOP leaders successfully blocked it. But with the ban having expired at the end of January, Democrats can now bring their bill up for a vote.
The Senate voted on a separate bill to repeal Canada’s tariffs in October. Given the difference in the bills, the upper chamber would need to take up and pass Wednesday’s legislation, sponsored by Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), to send it to Trump’s desk. Trump would likely veto any legislation to repeal tariffs.
But House Democrats are prepared to force several votes in the coming days and weeks to end tariffs against countries such as Mexico and Brazil. They also want to end Trump’s sweeping “Liberation Day” tariffs, which imposed a 10% across-the-board tariff on all trading partners. Those tariffs did not apply to Canada, Mexico, Russia, North Korea, Cuba, or Belarus.
The Senate voted on legislation to repeal the Brazil and Liberation Day tariffs last year.
Republicans argued during debate on the tariff repeal bill that keeping the tariffs in place is important to prevent fentanyl from entering the United States.
“I know we will never get to zero,” Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) said of fentanyl deaths on the floor. “All the president has asked Canada to do is show the kind of effort they can afford as a first-world country. … An effort should be shown, and if it’s shown, the president’s made it clear: These tariffs will immediately go away. So, this isn’t a tariff that is just because you don’t like someone.”
Several Republicans have blasted Democrats for looking to tie Trump’s hands, but Democrats and a handful of GOP lawmakers have expressed concerns that the president is overstepping his executive authority. Since Trump took office, he has sidestepped Congress on numerous policy decisions, despite areas such as tariffs constitutionally falling under the legislative branch’s authority.
Rep. Ryan Mackenzie (R-PA), a centrist who represents a purple district, told the Washington Examiner on Tuesday that Congress had been turning over tariff power to the executive branch for “a long time.”
“I think in some cases, there’s actually good justification for that, because as we see, Congress is very dysfunctional nowadays,” he said, noting that it would be difficult for Congress to respond quickly to rapidly changing trade practices coming out of countries such as China.
“But, I think we do need to continue that discussion to figure out what the right balance is,” Mackenzie said.
HOUSE FAILS TO EXTEND BAN ON TRUMP TARIFF REPEAL VOTES IN MAJOR BLOW TO JOHNSON
Democrats have pointed to the tariffs and subsequent “trade war” as a harm to the economy. A New York Times/Siena College survey in January found 54% of voters oppose Trump’s tariffs and 51% said the president’s policies have made their lives less affordable.
“I wish we could have had this vote a year ago, if in fact they believe this is a real emergency,” Meeks said on the floor. “I don’t know why it was held up for a year and tried to be prevented. Again, it’s a vote. Let the American people know where you stand. They will see it with your vote. Do you stand with them trying to fix the affordability crisis? Or do you stand with Donald Trump, and my Republican colleagues, who’s just taking care of those that the economy is booming for, the billionaires of our country?”
