Sen. Bob Corker said Saturday that he is working with other Senate Republicans on an effort to “push back” on President Donald Trump’s use of authority “in ways never intended and that are damaging to our country and our allies.”
Earlier Saturday, the Tennessee Republican tweeted out a pair of articles focusing onthe administration’s recent announcement that it is imposing steel and aluminum tariffs on Canada, Mexico and the European Union, and some of its other economic interventionsthat go against traditional free-market Republican orthodoxy. One, a Wall Street Journal opinion piece, argued the tariffs will harm the US economy and American foreign policy. The other, a Washington Post story, mentioned an administration plan to keep coal and nuclear power plants from closing .
In response to the articles, Corker wrote in a tweet, “These two stories feel like something I could have read in a local Caracas newspaper last week, not in America. Venezuela, here WE come!”
The senator said in a follow-up tweet, “I am working with like-minded Republican senators on ways to push back on the president using authorities in ways never intended and that are damaging to our country and our allies. Will Democrats join us?”
Corker and a number of congressional Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan, have criticized the administration’s announcement that it will impose the new tariffs on three of America’s biggest trading partners.
Corker called the decision “the wrong approach,” in a statement earlier in the week and said the move “represents an abuse of authority.”
