President Trump’s Pledge to Pay Every Adult $5,000 if Republicans Win Midterms Would Cost $1 Trillion

President Donald Trump made a major promise to Americans ahead of the November midterm elections.

Trump, 80, pledged to pay a bonus to every American adult if Republicans retain control of both the House and Senate during the Republican Party’s midterm convention in Dallas on Wednesday, September 10.

“If the Republicans win, you win with us and you get $5,000,” Trump said during his speech in a clip shared by NBC News. “It will be called the Trump Dividend.”

The president likened the proposed payments to the dividends companies pay their shareholders, citing what he described as “our tremendous strength and success economically.”

According to an Associated Press report published on Thursday, September 10, the payments could cost more than $1 trillion. Congress would need to approve the plan, and the White House has not provided additional details about the proposal.

According to the outlet, Vice President JD Vance suggested that wealthy Americans would not receive the payments and said tariff revenue could potentially help fund them. However, the amount needed for $5,000 payments would exceed the tariff revenue collected by the U.S.

During the convention, Trump acknowledged that a president’s party has historically faced difficulties during midterm elections but vowed that Republicans would buck that trend in November. “We’re going to change that,” he said, per the report. “There’s no reason for it.”

The proposal, however, raises questions about what would be required to make the payments a reality.

Attorney John Day said the proposal would be legal because eligibility would not depend on whether someone voted or which party they supported, the outlet reported. “This is a campaign promise,” Day said. “It’s not a payment to individuals to try to get them to vote in a particular way.”

Republican Senator Bernie Moreno of Ohio voiced support for the latest proposal Wednesday night. “I will get a bill ready so that we can get the Trump Dividend passed immediately after the November 3rd election,” Moreno wrote on X. “Because Republicans (and America) will win!”

Trump has floated the idea of dividend payments before. Last November, he promised to give Americans $2,000 payments from tariff revenue, which they have yet to receive, per ABC News.

However, members of the military received $1,776 payments that Trump called a “warrior dividend.”