Global climate models often simulate atmospheric conditions incorrectly due to their coarse grid resolution, flaws in their dynamics, and biases resulting from parameterization schemes. Here we document the magnitude and extent of minimum temperature biases in the CMIP6 model ensemble, relative to ERA5. Bias in the southern Cascadia region (i.e. Pacific Northwestern United States and southwestern British Columbia, Canada, spanning from the coast to the Rocky Mountains) stands out relative to the rest of North America, with some models showing a bias in excess of -10°C in the 1st percentile of daily winter minimum temperature. During the coldest minimum temperature days, the CMIP6 models show an anomalous high in mean sea level pressure in the Northeast Pacific – an atmospheric blocking pattern that is also present in ERA5. While this atmospheric blocking pattern is typically concurrent with cold temperatures across much of North America, terrain barriers such as the Rockies and Cascades prevent the cold air from reaching the Pacific Northwest in observation and reanalysis. Our results suggest that the bias in CMIP6 minimum temperatures is a result of unresolved topography in the Rockies and Cascade mountain ranges, such that the terrain does not adequately block cold air advection from the interior of the continent.