Lutnick Says American Taxpayers Would Not Foot the Bill for Trump’s Proposed $5,000 ‘Dividend’ Checks

With questions swirling about how President Trump plans to make good on his promise of sending $5,000 “dividend” checks to every adult citizen in America if Republicans hold on to control of Congress, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick says the money to pay for the checks would not come from American taxpayers’ pockets. On the first night of the Republican National Committee Midterm Convention, Mr. Trump made the unexpected promise of the $5,000 checks. The proposal was quickly criticized. Democrats called the promise a “bribe,” and budget hawks criticized the proposed spending while America is running a $2 trillion deficit and the national debt surpassed $40 trillion. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget panned the idea, saying it would cost $1.2 trillion, fuel inflation, lead to higher interest rates, and increase the debt. In an interview published on Friday, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told NBC News that the funds to pay for the “dividend” checks would not be “tax money.” Instead, he said the Trump Administration would “earn the money that Donald Trump wants to pay out, not from the deficit and not from taxpayers.”Mr. Lutnick said the funds could come from the revenue generated by the Trump Platinum Card, a program that lets wealthy individuals pay $5 million to extend their visas. “We have a waitlist of more than 100,000 people who want to come,” the commerce secretary said. “That’s $500 billion.”Mr. Lutnick said the funds could also come from the 433 million shares in Intel the federal government purchased last year. He noted that the shares were purchased at around $20.47 per share, and that the price has increased to around $100, adding, “So we’re up $50 billion.”Several members of the Trump Administration have proposed other ways to pay for the checks. The director of the National Economic Council, Kevin Hassett, said on Fox Business that the “logical place where something like that might happen” would be in Congress through the budget reconciliation process.Vice President Vance said that the money could come from the revenues generated by Mr. Trump’s tariffs. However, the Tax Policy Center estimates that it will take nearly a decade for the tariffs to raise enough money to pay for the dividend checks. Some top Republicans poured cold water on the idea that Americans will ever see the checks — even if the party holds onto control of Congress. The chairman of the NRCC, Richard Hudson, told Politico he does not believe the proposal could “pass this Congress” because “Democrats in the Senate will never go through with it.”An unnamed House Republican told Politico, “I see zero chance of this happening.”Despite the doubts about the checks, Mr. Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that his plan “will happen.”“When I say something, I mean it! The $5,000 Dividend will happen because the People of our Country deserve it,” the president wrote.

Lutnick Says American Taxpayers Would Not Foot the Bill for Trump’s Proposed $5,000 ‘Dividend’ Checks

Lutnick Says American Taxpayers Would Not Foot the Bill for Trump’s Proposed $5,000 ‘Dividend’ Checks

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