Abstract
The Republican Party has been the party most supportive of free trade in American politics for half a century. President Donald Trump, who is a Republican, holds a different stance from his party on free trade. We assess how Trump's China tariffs in mid-2018 impacted the performance of his party in its midterm house elections later that year. We construct a measure of each county's exposure to Trump's China tariffs and merge that with the Republican share of votes in the county. We find that the counties heavily exposed to the tariffs were more supportive of their Republican house candidates. This association is stronger and causal in counties that previously voted for Democratic politicians. The Republican Party, despite losing its majority in the house, would have lost more seats without Trump's China tariffs.
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