Senate rejects plan to block Trump's tariffs

On Wednesday, the US Senate failed to pass a resolution aimed at rejecting President Donald Trump's tariff agenda.

According to Fox News, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) had introduced the resolution to end Trump's "national emergency" as a "privileged" one, meaning it would require a vote regardless of the chamber being held by Republicans. The House has indicated that it will not pursue the same action.

The resolution failed 49-49. Three Republicans joined all Democrats present in attempting to stop Trump's agenda.

In advance of the vote, several Republicans signaled they favored stopping the new levies, forcing Vice President JD Vance to be called in to break the tie in his role as president of the Senate. Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Susan Collins (R-ME), and Rand Paul (R-K), split from the rest of the Republicans.

Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) didn’t vote, and Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) didn’t vote because he was on a flight.

After the vote, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) proposed a motion to reconsider, then moved to table the initial motion, which would have prevented Democrats from forcing another vote.

That vote was also a tie, but once again, Vice President Vance cast the deciding vote.

Paul said during his remarks on the Senate floor earlier in the day, "There was an old-fashioned conservative principle that believed that less taxes were better than more taxes. That if you tax something, you got less of it. So that if you place a new tax on trade, you'll get less trade."

He continued, "There was also this idea that you didn't do taxation without representation. That idea goes not only back to our American Revolution, it goes back to the English Civil War as well. It goes back probably to Magna Carta.”