‘A sham’: U.S. senators push to pass bill aimed at undoing tariffs against Canada

U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia speaks to CTV News on April 1, 2025, about a bill that would overturn tariffs against Canada if it passes into law.

As U.S. President Donald Trump’s planned reciprocal tariffs loom this week, U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine is among Democrats pushing to pass legislation that aims to revoke them.

Kaine of Virginia, along with fellow Democratic senators Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Mark Warner of Virginia, filed the bill March 12 to undo the tariffs on Canadian goods.

Kaine, Hillary Clinton’s Democratic running mate in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, expects the vote from the Senate on Wednesday.

The resolution challenges Trump’s emergency powers, which Kaine said the president is using to justify imposing the massive tariffs on Canadian imports into the United States.

“It (the resolution) is a little used procedure that enables even one senator to force a vote on the Senate floor to challenge a presidentially declared emergency,” Kaine said in a video interview with CTVNews.ca on Tuesday from Washington, D.C.

The legislation is aimed at cancelling the tariffs by terminating the emergency powers Trump invoked under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which is normally used against foreign threats and adversaries.

While the White House didn’t respond to CTVNews.ca’s request Tuesday to comment on the bill, Trump singled out four Republican senators in a post on Truth Social early Wednesday morning and accused them of “suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

“They are playing with the lives of the American people, and right into the hands of the Radical Left Democrats and Drug Cartels,” Trump wrote, reiterating that he’s justifying the tariffs because of the “large amounts” of fentanyl he alleges comes from Canada, though some data disputes his claims.

Referring to Republican senators Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Rand Paul of Kentucky, he said, “The Senate Bill is just a ploy of the Dems to show and expose the weakness of certain Republicans ... it is not going anywhere because the House will never approve it and I, as your President, will never sign it.”

Even if the legislation passes, it won’t immediately stop Trump from imposing any tariffs on Canada, Kaine said.

Warner explained how Trump’s actions have had an impact on U.S. relations with Canada, noting “the bitterness,” “unwillingness to buy American products” and “lack of trust” many Canadians may now feel towards Americans.

Warner, whose maternal grandparents are Canadian, said during a press conference in Washington on Tuesday that he knows Prime Minister Mark Carney and spoke with him Monday night. “The reaction of, gosh, kind of his head still spinning, of how did we get here? How did we get to a point that a nation that we’ve probably, next to Britain, have had the closest relationship with since the founding of our nation is being turned into an enemy?”

What are the chances of passing the bill?

The bill must pass both houses of the U.S. Congress, divided into the Senate and House of Representatives, in order to become law.

While Kaine mentioned challenges to passing the bill in the Senate, he said he believes those chances “are definitely improving.”

“Republicans are reluctant to stand up against (Trump), but ... I already have three Republicans – senators (Susan) Collins of Maine, (Thom) Tillis of North Carolina and Rand Paul of Kentucky – who said they’re going to vote with me against the fake Canadian emergency, and that others are considering it,” Kaine said. “I’m trying to get a good vote in the Senate.”

However, he said if the bill passes the Senate, it would still have to pass the Republican-majority U.S. House of Representatives and Trump must sign it into law.

If the legislation passes both houses, Trump could veto and then lawmakers could try to override it, Kaine said.

“That would be difficult to override a veto,” he said, noting it would take a two-thirds vote in both the House and Senate to accomplish that.

In addition, the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives voted to block the ability of Congress to challenge Trump’s tariffs and immigration measures for the rest of the year, Reuters reported on March 11.

‘Not a Canadian emergency’

Kaine said Trump is also justifying the tariffs on Canada because of what the president calls a fentanyl crisis at the northern border, even when the numbers don’t support that.

He said he believes Trump is imposing tariffs so he can use the revenue to give a tax break to the wealthiest people.

“There’s a tax bill that is the next big agenda item for the Republicans, and they need to come up with a way to pay for the tax bill,” Kaine said. “So the way they’re going to pay for it is all these dramatic cuts to government, firing people, closing down the Department of Education. They’re going try to find savings there, plus tariff revenue, and that’s going to be how they will finance this tax cut for the uber wealthy that they’re promoting. So the whole Canadian emergency is a sham.”