diff --git a/pkg/ccl/importccl/import_stmt.go b/pkg/ccl/importccl/import_stmt.go
index e57fe072c769..84612478ac0b 100644
--- a/pkg/ccl/importccl/import_stmt.go
+++ b/pkg/ccl/importccl/import_stmt.go
@@ -16,6 +16,10 @@ import (
 	"strconv"
 	"strings"
 
+	"github.com/pkg/errors"
+	"google.golang.org/grpc/codes"
+	"google.golang.org/grpc/status"
+
 	"github.com/cockroachdb/cockroach/pkg/build"
 	"github.com/cockroachdb/cockroach/pkg/ccl/backupccl"
 	"github.com/cockroachdb/cockroach/pkg/ccl/storageccl"
@@ -35,7 +39,6 @@ import (
 	"github.com/cockroachdb/cockroach/pkg/util/log"
 	"github.com/cockroachdb/cockroach/pkg/util/protoutil"
 	"github.com/cockroachdb/cockroach/pkg/util/tracing"
-	"github.com/pkg/errors"
 )
 
 const (
@@ -649,6 +652,13 @@ func doDistributedCSVTransform(
 			return storageccl.MakeKeyRewriter(descs)
 		},
 	); err != nil {
+		// Check if this was a context canceled error and restart if it was.
+		if s, ok := status.FromError(errors.Cause(err)); ok {
+			if s.Code() == codes.Canceled && s.Message() == context.Canceled.Error() {
+				return jobs.NewRetryJobError("node failure")
+			}
+		}
+
 		// If the job was canceled, any of the distsql processors could have been
 		// the first to encounter the .Progress error. This error's string is sent
 		// through distsql back here, so we can't examine the err type in this case
diff --git a/pkg/ccl/importccl/import_stmt_test.go b/pkg/ccl/importccl/import_stmt_test.go
index 71233a7061a8..0a43e3e313fa 100644
--- a/pkg/ccl/importccl/import_stmt_test.go
+++ b/pkg/ccl/importccl/import_stmt_test.go
@@ -1159,6 +1159,80 @@ func TestImportControlJob(t *testing.T) {
 	})
 }
 
+// TestImportWorkerFailure tests that IMPORT can restart after the failure
+// of a worker node.
+func TestImportWorkerFailure(t *testing.T) {
+	defer leaktest.AfterTest(t)()
+
+	// TODO(mjibson): Although this test passes most of the time it still
+	// sometimes fails because not all kinds of failures caused by shutting a
+	// node down are detected and retried.
+	t.Skip("flakey due to undetected kinds of failures when the node is shutdown")
+
+	defer func(oldInterval time.Duration) {
+		jobs.DefaultAdoptInterval = oldInterval
+	}(jobs.DefaultAdoptInterval)
+	jobs.DefaultAdoptInterval = 100 * time.Millisecond
+
+	allowResponse := make(chan struct{})
+	params := base.TestClusterArgs{}
+	params.ServerArgs.Knobs.Store = &storage.StoreTestingKnobs{
+		TestingResponseFilter: jobutils.BulkOpResponseFilter(&allowResponse),
+	}
+
+	ctx := context.Background()
+	tc := testcluster.StartTestCluster(t, 3, params)
+	defer tc.Stopper().Stop(ctx)
+	sqlDB := sqlutils.MakeSQLRunner(tc.Conns[0])
+
+	srv := httptest.NewServer(http.HandlerFunc(func(w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request) {
+		if r.Method == "GET" {
+			_, _ = w.Write([]byte(r.URL.Path[1:]))
+		}
+	}))
+	defer srv.Close()
+
+	count := 20
+	urls := make([]string, count)
+	for i := 0; i < count; i++ {
+		urls[i] = fmt.Sprintf("'%s/%d'", srv.URL, i)
+	}
+	csvURLs := strings.Join(urls, ", ")
+	query := fmt.Sprintf(`IMPORT TABLE t (i INT PRIMARY KEY) CSV DATA (%s) WITH sstsize = '1B'`, csvURLs)
+
+	errCh := make(chan error)
+	go func() {
+		_, err := sqlDB.DB.Exec(query)
+		errCh <- err
+	}()
+	select {
+	case allowResponse <- struct{}{}:
+	case err := <-errCh:
+		t.Fatalf("%s: query returned before expected: %s", err, query)
+	}
+	var jobID int64
+	sqlDB.QueryRow(t, `SELECT id FROM system.jobs ORDER BY created DESC LIMIT 1`).Scan(&jobID)
+
+	// Shut down a node. This should force LoadCSV to fail in its current
+	// execution. It should detect this as a context canceled error.
+	tc.StopServer(1)
+
+	close(allowResponse)
+	// We expect the statement to fail.
+	if err := <-errCh; !testutils.IsError(err, "node failure") {
+		t.Fatal(err)
+	}
+
+	// But the job should be restarted and succeed eventually.
+	if err := jobutils.WaitForJob(sqlDB.DB, jobID); err != nil {
+		t.Fatal(err)
+	}
+	sqlDB.CheckQueryResults(t,
+		`SELECT * FROM t ORDER BY i`,
+		sqlDB.QueryStr(t, `SELECT * FROM generate_series(0, $1)`, count-1),
+	)
+}
+
 // TestImportLivenessWithRestart tests that a node liveness transition
 // during IMPORT correctly resumes after the node executing the job
 // becomes non-live (from the perspective of the jobs registry).
diff --git a/pkg/sql/jobs/registry.go b/pkg/sql/jobs/registry.go
index de7a4e42a66b..809025d66915 100644
--- a/pkg/sql/jobs/registry.go
+++ b/pkg/sql/jobs/registry.go
@@ -424,6 +424,19 @@ func getResumeHook(typ jobspb.Type, settings *cluster.Settings) (Resumer, error)
 	return nil, errors.Errorf("no resumer are available for %s", typ)
 }
 
+type retryJobError string
+
+// NewRetryJobError creates a new error that, if returned by a Resumer,
+// indicates to the jobs registry that the job should be restarted in the
+// background.
+func NewRetryJobError(s string) error {
+	return retryJobError(s)
+}
+
+func (r retryJobError) Error() string {
+	return string(r)
+}
+
 // resume starts or resumes a job. If no error is returned then the job was
 // asynchronously executed. The job is executed with the ctx, so ctx must
 // only by canceled if the job should also be canceled. resultsCh is passed
@@ -438,10 +451,13 @@ func (r *Registry) resume(
 		defer cleanup()
 		resumeErr := resumer.Resume(ctx, job, phs, resultsCh)
 		if resumeErr != nil && ctx.Err() != nil {
-			r.unregister(*job.id)
 			// The context was canceled. Tell the user, but don't attempt to mark the
 			// job as failed because it can be resumed by another node.
-			errCh <- errors.Errorf("job %d: node liveness error: restarting in the background", *job.id)
+			resumeErr = NewRetryJobError("node liveness error")
+		}
+		if e, ok := resumeErr.(retryJobError); ok {
+			r.unregister(*job.id)
+			errCh <- errors.Errorf("job %d: %s: restarting in background", *job.id, e)
 			return
 		}
 		terminal := true