On Wednesday, the Senate passed a joint resolution that will effectively put an end to one of the most egregious programs that exists today: the U.S. Department of Agriculture catfish inspection program.

It’s actually disappointing that the vote was as close as it was—55-43.

It may sound a bit silly, admittedly, but this program created in the 2008 farm bill is a classic example of legislators pushing a program for the benefit of a very narrow special interest without regard for the harm to taxpayers, consumers, and other industries.

If Congress can’t get rid of this program, it will be clear it isn’t serious about getting rid of waste.

Here are five things you should know about this program:

1) The program is duplicative: The Food and Drug Administration has historically inspected seafood and still does. However, a special exception was created just for catfish, which would now be inspected by the USDA; an agency that has no expertise with seafood.

Seafood processing facilities have to comply with both the USDA regulatory regime (for catfish) and the FDA’s regulatory regime for all other seafood.

2) There’s no unique safety concerns about catfish: The FDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention consider commercially raised catfish to be a low-risk food.

The independent Government Accountability Office has stated the program “would result in duplication of federal programs and cost taxpayers millions of dollars annually without enhancing the safety of catfish intended for human consumption.”

3) The program risked trade retaliation against the U.S.: The program is quite simply a trade protectionist scheme to protect the domestic catfish industry.

By moving inspections to the USDA, foreign exporters won’t be able to export catfish to the U.S. until its country develops an equivalent regulatory scheme to the U.S.

This process of developing such a scheme and getting the blessing of the U.S. could take five years or even longer. Some countries may not even bother to develop such a regulatory system that is completely unjustified and is just a way to protect domestic catfish producers.

During this time as foreign exports are kept off the market, domestic catfish farmers will have a monopoly and the supply of catfish will decline (likely significantly driving up consumer prices).

Vietnam has already expressed its concerns before the World Trade Organization. As reported, the National Fisheries Institute has said the program “is in clear violation of commitments to the World Trade Organization (WTO) and will result in a lawsuit that will cost U.S. agriculture exports.”

Other agricultural interests, such as meat packers and soybean farmers, will likely get harmed from any retaliation rather than domestic catfish farmers.

4) There has been widespread opposition: It’s amazing that the program is still around given the incredible bipartisan opposition and continual criticism of the program by the independent Government Accountability Office.

Not known for its strong statements, GAO titled one of its reports, “Seafood Safety: Responsibility for Inspecting Catfish Should not Be Assigned to USDA.” That seems pretty clear where GAO stands on the issue.

In 2013, the House had a provision in its farm bill that would have repealed the program. President Barack Obama’s 2014 fiscal year budget sought to eliminate the program.

5) Significant cost. The estimated cost to taxpayers is about $14 million a year. Then there are the costs to consumers and from the trade retaliation.

Congress has a chance to kill this program. The Senate took a first step in doing so by passing the resolution. Now it goes to the House.

Obama is unlikely to veto it. This resolution and efforts to get rid of this program are a great test to see if sound policy and eliminating waste are more important to legislators than helping out a special interest.