Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) said Thursday on CNN’s “The Situation Room” that Congress should reassert its authority to approve tariffs by passing the Trade Review Act of 2025, which would require a joint resolution of approval for the new tariffs and allow Congress to end tariffs with a resolution of disapproval.
Host Wolf Blitzer said, “You and Republican Senator Chuck Grassley actually introduced a bill to reassert congressional authority over U.S. trade policies. How would this bill achieve that? And do you think there’s enough support for this legislation to pass both the Senate and the House?”
Cantwell said, “We thought it was critical that we get this discussion going. The fact that Congress’s duty and responsibility is not just interstate commerce but foreign commerce. Senator Grassley, as a former chairman of the Finance Committee, has played a key role in making sure that we continue to play this role. So we’re saying that, yes, Congress should review these issues, that it is time that in the past, we may have directed a president to negotiate trade agreements but this is time now because of the lack of rules based approach to this, that Congress should review this.”
She added, “I actually think it’s a good thing to show that Congress is going to reinsert itself. But the point here is the reason why you have a trade regime is to have rules, to have a rules-based discussion. That’s so important when you’re negotiating a trade agreement. When you go the tariff route, you are just throwing down and basically causing the economic disruption.”
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