House Republican leaders this week tried to advance an odd policy: Speaker Mike Johnson, eager to do the White House’s bidding, tried to neuter his own chamber and prevent his own members from voting on trade tariffs — over which, by law, Congress is supposed to have authority.

GOP leaders said they preferred a model in which Donald Trump could continue to act unilaterally, raising and lowering tariffs based entirely on his whims, without pesky members of a coequal branch getting in the way.

However, Johnson’s effort failed, and a bipartisan House majority agreed not to surrender their legal authority.

One day later, the Republican-led House voted 219-211 to repeal the president’s tariffs on Canada, with six GOP members joining nearly every House Democrat.

The practical effects of the vote are limited — even if the Senate were to approve the same measure, Trump would veto it — but the political implications were significant.

For one thing, a variety of Republican members whose constituents have been hurt by tariffs — Iowa’s Mariannette Miller-Meeks and Pennsylvania’s Ryan Mackenzie, I’m looking in your direction — stuck with their party, in a vote that might very well be used against them as the midterm elections approach.

For another, Trump took the opportunity to direct some fresh threats at members of his own party. Time magazine reported:

Trump warned against any dissent from within his party as the vote was coming to a close.

‘Any Republican, in the House or the Senate, that votes against TARIFFS will seriously suffer the consequences come Election time, and that includes Primaries!’ he said. ‘Tariffs have given us economic and national security, and no Republican should be responsible for destroying this privilege.’

The online posturing was easy to dismiss, in part because some of the members who voted for the measure are already retiring, and in part because it’s too late to find new primary rivals for the others.

But the online harangue was emblematic of a larger point: Trump’s grip on Congress is slipping, and he isn’t sure what to do about it.

To be sure, it’s best not to overstate matters. There are 218 House Republicans, and on the vote to undo tariffs on Canada, six GOP members broke ranks. It wasn’t exactly a tidal wave.

But there’s also a larger context to consider.

The conventional wisdom in many political circles is that Trump’s control over congressional Republicans is complete and unrelenting. The president barks orders and GOP lawmakers on Capitol Hill obey, motivated by some combination of fear, partisan allegiance, loyalty and ideological agreement.

But with the president’s approval rating sinking to unusually low levels, and Republican members expressing understandable concern about their own electoral futures, his control plainly isn’t what it once was.

Trump is facing intraparty pushback on tariffs. And his racism. And his administration’s immigration enforcement agenda. And his Greenland obsession. And federal funding of science. And the absurd criminal case against Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. And Affordable Care Act subsidies. And military actions in Venezuela.

What’s more, all of this comes on the heels of related developments from late last year, when Republicans rejected some of Trump’s ridiculous nominees and voted to rebuke his trade agenda.

A recent New York Times analysis noted, “Together, the events illustrated that the president, who for a year has been able to count on a largely compliant Republican-led Congress with no appetite to challenge him, is facing new defiance as lawmakers concerned about their political futures look to assert themselves ahead of midterm voting.”

An adept president with extensive leadership experience might be able to navigate these waters and take steps to keep his GOP allies aligned with the White House. Trump, however, appears to have no idea how to do this — he is, after all, the least experienced president in American history — which suggests his troubles will only get worse as the midterm elections draw closer.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.