Two Democrats and two Republicans in the Senate asked the administration to press Canada on changing how it administers tariff rate quotas for U.S. dairy exports as it approaches a renegotiation.
Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, D-Md., introduced a bill that would direct the International Trade Commission to do an investigation on the effects of the 25% and 10% tariffs on Canada and Mexico, including on consumer prices, and the impact on small businesses and farmers, including due to retaliation from those countries, within a year of enactment. The bill lays out the sectors to be covered, and also asks the ITC economists to estimate the impact on domestic jobs and investment.
Rep. Rudy Yakym, R-Ind., introduced a private bill to allow a company that imported golf cart tires to reliquidate the entries years later, so that they can recoup nearly $2 million.
Senators from the swing state of Georgia, a major manufacturing hub for metal-intensive auto, aerospace and solar industries, say that business leaders are telling them that the see-sawing tariff announcements from the White House are unnerving and causing them to put the brakes on planning expansions.
Two pro-trade Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee reintroduced a bill that would restrict the president's ability to use Section 232 to impose tariffs without Congress' consent. Four other House Democrats are co-sponsoring the bill.
Senators and witnesses called for the adoption of free trade agreements with Latin American countries to stave off Chinese influence in the region through trade, during a March 5 hearing on advancing American interests in the Western Hemisphere.
Rep. Gregory Meeks of New York, the top Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Richard Neal of Massachusetts, the top Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee, and four other Democratic members in the House introduced resolutions March 6 that, if successful, would end the emergencies that President Donald Trump is relying on to hike tariffs on Canadian and Mexican goods.
Three senators introduced a resolution that would terminate the emergency that the president declared on the northern border -- which, if successful, would terminate the 25% tariff on most Canadian goods and 10% tariff on energy that President Donald Trump imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Rep. Jason Smith, R-Mo., speaking March 5 at the American Enterprise Institute about the path to pass a tax cuts extension and spending cuts bill, said that tariff revenue will help to pay down government debt, even if it's not part of the legislative package.
The House Committee on Homeland Security issued its oversight plan for the year, and only mentioned trade once, when it wrote that it plans to "review the Department’s efforts to better facilitate legitimate trade and travel with updates to trusted traveler programs and expansion of CBP Preclearance locations."