Economy

Democratic midterm wins would shake up the tariff debate — but not roll back Trump's tariffs, Reuters reports

Washington • November 1, 2026 • By Press Pass USA

Editorial illustration: shipping containers and port cranes at dusk, with the U.S. Capitol dome in the distance

Editorial illustration — Press Pass USA

If Democrats win control of Congress in Tuesday's midterm elections, President Donald Trump's trade agenda will face a new source of friction — a cascade of oversight hearings and symbolic tariff rollback votes next year — but Trump will remain undeterred in his push for more tariffs, Reuters reported Sunday, November 1.

The reason is arithmetic. Democrats would need a net gain of four seats in both the House and the Senate to overturn Republicans' narrow 218-214 and 53-47 majorities, Reuters noted, and even then they would fall far short of the veto-proof two-thirds majority needed to override a presidential veto. Opinion polls favor Democrats to win the House, while the Senate remains too close to call.

"Democrats are going to try a lot of things. I just don't think anything's going to get across the finish line because neither party will have a veto-proof majority in any scenario," William Reinsch, a non-resident adviser to the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, told Reuters.

Still, control of even one chamber would hand Democrats the committee gavels — and with them, a platform for a steady stream of hearings and investigations into Trump's trade policies, a sharp break from Republicans' largely hands-off approach over the past two years. Senator Ron Wyden, the top Democrat on the tax- and trade-focused Senate Finance Committee, told Reuters that repealing Trump's tariffs on Canada, "which are raising prices and harming communities on both sides of the border," would be one of the most obvious priorities.

Democrats could also stage symbolic votes on long-sidelined trade bills such as Senator Chuck Schumer's "End Trump's Tariff Tax Act," which would scrap the statute behind the punitive tariffs on Canadian goods — Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930 — along with the statute used for Trump's temporary 10% global tariffs, Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974. The bill, which has 28 co-sponsors including Wyden, also calls for refunding all duties collected under those laws.

Key oversight targets would include the opaque process for deciding tariff exemptions that benefit specific companies, how tariffs are hitting small businesses, and how the administration is doling out hundreds of billions of dollars in investment funds pledged by Japan, South Korea and other trading partners in recent trade deals, Reuters reported. Greta Peisch, a former general counsel at the U.S. Trade Representative's office, said the effort could "form the basis of a proposal for the presidential elections" in 2028, even if it cannot pass right away.

The White House, for its part, signaled no wavering. Trump will continue to pursue his tariff-driven trade agenda aimed at protecting American workers, farmers and businesses from being "ripped off" by past trade deals, White House spokesman Matthew Middleton said in a statement to Reuters, adding that the agenda "has already secured almost 20 fair trade deals and trillions in manufacturing investments." Reuters also reported that the administration is developing plans to rely more heavily on executive actions, including on trade, without congressional approval — and that a forthcoming investigation into excess industrial capacity in 16 major trading partners could bring still more tariffs.

The debate lands against a trade deficit that tariffs have not yet narrowed. A report by the German Economic Institute, seen by Reuters, found that the U.S. goods trade deficit reached $130 billion in August — higher than two years earlier — even as the European Union's share of that deficit fell to 7% in August, down from 20% in August 2024. Foreign direct investment inflows fell 8.2% to $248 billion in 2025, 18% below the 2015–2024 average, the report found.

Sources: Reuters, "Democratic wins would shift Congress' trade debate but fall short of US tariff rollbacks" by David Lawder (Nov. 1, 2026); German Economic Institute (IW) report, as seen by Reuters (Nov. 1, 2026).