(AFP) – The Republican-led US House of Representatives on Wednesday quashed a bid by the minority Democrats to force a vote on eliminating President Donald Trump’s scaled-down global tariffs. A measure approved in a roughly party-line vote allows Speaker Mike Johnson to slow-walk any Democratic resolution to cancel the national emergency Trump declared to justify imposing the levies.
The National Emergencies Act allows “disapproval” measures to be fast-tracked for a floor vote within 15 days of their introduction. But House Republicans passed a provision stipulating that, for the purposes of considering the emergency, the remainder of the financial year would count as one calendar day. The legislative sleight-of-hand means Republican leaders will now be able to keep such a move off the floor until October.
The latest action scuppers a resolution introduced by a group of House Democrats on Tuesday to end the national emergency that underpinned Trump’s tariff authority. The issue is less pressing than it was 24 hours ago, as Trump abruptly backed down Wednesday in his global trade war, with a 90-day pause for most countries on his sweeping so-called “reciprocal tariffs.” Trump has veto power in any case over legislation that comes to his desk without the support of two-thirds of both chambers of Congress, meaning the effort was always likely doomed.
But Democrats still voiced outrage, accusing Republicans of allowing Congress to become a bystander on foreign trade rather than honoring its duty of oversight set out in the constitution. “House Republicans are declaring that the days are no longer days and that time has literally stopped,” Congressman Gregory Meeks, who spearheaded the effort to rein in Trump, said in the House. “The speaker is petrified that members of this House will actually have to take a vote on lowering costs for the American people.”
But Republican committee chair Virginia Foxx noted that Democrats had used a similar tactic in 2021 to stop Republicans ending the national emergency dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic. “A reminder about those who live in glass houses — this is a tool utilized by both Democrat and Republican majorities,” she said. Johnson told reporters the vote gave Trump “an appropriate level of authority” to deal with unfair trade practices. “That’s part of the role of the president… to negotiate with other countries, the other heads of state, and he is doing that, in my estimation, very effectively right now,” he said.
© 2024 AFP
