President Donald Trump on Monday complained that Democrats’ efforts to win a majority in Congress in the November midterm elections are blocking his plan to reward voters for electing Republicans with $5,000 payments to every American adult.
The president lashed out in a Truth Social post in which he complained that the payouts — which he falsely claimed to be a “dividend … due to the fact that our Country is taking in Trillions of Dollars of Economic Development, Investment, and Pure SUCCESS” rather than financed with borrowed money (and dependent on, as he said last week, Republicans retaining their majorities in the House and Senate) — was “being criticized by ‘Dumocrats’ who are hoping that it never happens.”
“But it will,” he vowed. Of course, for Democrats to root for the supposed $5,000 payout to Americans — which they have labeled a “bribe” for votes — they’d also have to be hoping their own candidates lose.
Trump suggested the Democratic opposition to the proposal, which he floated during a speech to the GOP midterm convention in Texas last week, was similar in effectiveness to Democrats’ efforts to block the partisan One Big Beautiful Bill spending package he signed last year — or the $1,776 payments he ordered sent to active duty service members earlier this year that came from funds Congress had appropriated to renovate dilapidated military housing.
“Everyone said it could not be done, but it was, our Military Patriots got the money, and loved it. When I say something, I mean it! The $5,000 Dividend will happen because the People of our Country deserve it,” he said before adding: “VOTE REPUBLICAN — MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
Experts have said Trump’s proposed payments would total more than $1.2 trillion, on top of a fiscal 2026 budget deficit that the Treasury Departmentpegs at nearly $2 trillion.
The president has claimed he doesn’t need congressional approval for the “Trump dividend” checks he announced during last week’s Republican Midterm Convention in Dallas, which took place as polls show Democrats with an average 6.6 percent lead in the so-called generic congressional ballot.
But Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana said Sunday that Trump would “need Congress to act.”
During an appearance on CNN’s State of the Union that preceded Trump’s remarks, Johnson called the one-time payments “a creative idea” that “got a lot of people excited.”
“Of course, the devil’s in the details. We have to figure all that out,” he said. “But I think what he was articulating there…is that he’s saying that, if you want more money in your pocket, you have to keep Republicans in charge,” he said.