What’s the point of winning, in these narrowly divided times we live in, what is now considered a wide majority in the Senate if your party isn’t going to flex and utilize that power on a daily basis? That’s a great question to ask three nominally Republican senators who appeared to give Joe Autopen Biden more leeway and grace than they’re showing the leader of their party, President Donald Trump.
The U.S. Senate only narrowly blocked a bid to repeal all of President Trump’s existing tariffs Wednesday night, in a bipartisan clash that saw three Republicans join Democrats in protesting the economic disruption the levies have caused. The late-night vote ended in a 49–49 tie, allowing the tariffs to remain in place for now. Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) was returning from a visit to South Korea and therefore was not on hand to vote, while noted anti-Trump RINO Mitch McConnell, who is thankfully retiring, didn’t vote at all (in this case, a good thing).
Allies of the White House immediately condemned GOP Sens. Rand Paul (R-KY) [what is going on, Kentucky Republicans – can’t you do better??], Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), and Susan Collins (R-ME) for opposing the president’s tariffs. Their votes, though, were hardly surprising, as each has publicly voiced deep dissatisfaction with the current policy, the AP reports.
Last month, during a floor speech, Sen. Murkowski expressed her support for an argument made by Democrats that Congress should reassert its control over the nation’s tariff policy. “I think it’s time for Congress to reassert itself, whether it’s on tariffs, whether it’s on the power of appropriation, whether it’s overseeing the bodies, the agencies that we as a body have authorized,” she said — though she and the rest of the RINO pack were silent on clawing back Legislative Branch power when Autopen’s minions were running the show.
This is beyond outrageous. President Trump is literally trying to remake the global financial order for the first time since the end of World War II, because it is grossly aligned against Americans and American interests. We’ve become the world’s piggy bank and we get robbed on a daily basis. Tariffs are a powerful tool in the president’s economic arsenal to right the global economic ship and he’s doing that as we speak, with dozens of countries lining up to cut deals. But Paul, Murkowski, and Collins want to take that power away — but only from Trump. Frankly, if this is how it’s gonna be, GOP primaries should be in all of their futures. Enough already.