Speaking at the RNC in Dallas on the night of Wednesday, September 9, President Donald Trump came out with a major new midterms campaign pledge, vowing to issue $5000 “dividend” checks to the American public if Republicans are re-elected in the midterm elections and hold both houses of Congress. He framed the policy as being a way of ensuring all Americans participate in the economic success we are currently seeing.
Announcing the idea to tremendous excitement and applause, the president began by saying that he was in a position to make the dividend promise because America is doing so well economically, saying, “What we’re doing is because we’ve done so well, and because our country is making so much money that only I can make this promise to you.”
Continuing, he then announced that he would issue the dividends to American citizens if the Republicans hold both houses of Congress, doing so as a way of helping all Americans participate fully in our booming economy. He said, “And here is my promise: if the Republicans win the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, both of them, because of our economic, tremendous economic success, like in history, we’ve never had anything like what’s happening.”
Finally getting to the point and commenting on the dividend checks he wants to send out if voters throw their support behind him by electing Republicans who can enact his agenda, he said, “But because of our tremendous strength and success economically, I will issue a dividend to every adult citizen in the United States of America for $5,000.”
Adding to that, the president asked voters to get over whatever dislike of individual Republicans they might have and to vote for the Republican Party generally, as it needs to win, suggesting to them that they show up to vote like he is the one on the ballot. “I’m asking you to pretend that I’m on the ballot,” he said.
Watch him here:
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Speaking after the president, Vice President JD Vance walked back the dividend payment concept just a little bit, suggesting that it would not go to the wealthy, who are already benefiting from the booming economy and good markets, and that it would instead be paid for by American tariff revenues.
It is unclear if tariff revenues could support the expected cost of the proposed dividend, even if tariffs are increased back to their higher levels from before the Supreme Court tossed out much of President Trump’s tariff program. Further, it appears that Congress would need to go along with this payment, which might set up President Trump for more conflict with his party’s RINO holdouts, and is probably why he focused so heavily on the payment only happening if Republicans win both houses.
Commenting on the economic success America has seen with his administration in charge, the president said that his second term had been “the most successful two years, financially and every other way, in the history of the presidency”. He added, “There is a crazy little sick cloud over our country. We will defeat communism in America.”