articleFILE – U.S. President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office at the White House on October 06, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
President Donald Trump on Sunday again hinted that he was considering using his tariff revenue to send stimulus checks to Americans.
Here’s what the president said, and what he’s said before on the topic of a 2025 stimulus check:
Trump tariff dividend
What they’re saying:
In an early morning Truth Social post, Trump touted the successes he said his administration has been seeing after implementing his tariffs, and said that “A dividend of at least $2,000 a person (not including high income people!) would be paid to everyone.”
Trump gave no other details about if and when the checks were actually coming, or which high-income people could be excluded.
Later on Sunday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was asked during an ABC interview about Trump’s post and suggested the “dividend” could come via the tax cuts already passed this year in Trump’s bill.
“I haven’t spoken to the president about this yet, but, you know, it could — the $2,000 dividend could come in lots of forms, in lots of ways, George (Stephanopoulos). You know, it could be just the tax decreases that we are seeing on the president’s agenda. You know, no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, no tax on Social Security. Deductibility of auto loans. So, you know, those are substantial deductions that, you know, are being financed in the tax bill,” Bessent said, according to the published transcript.
2025 stimulus checks
The backstory:
This isn’t the first time Trump has discussed the idea of giving stimulus checks to Americans since his return to the Oval Office.
Last month, he said during an interview with One America News that he was looking at sending stimulus checks worth $1,000- $2,000.
And earlier this year, when Elon Musk was running the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), he and Trump were considering $5,000 stimulus checks from savings DOGE found in cutting federal costs, but it never came to fruition.
Tariff revenue
Big picture view:
The Trump administration has said it has collected billions of dollars in tariff revenue.
By the numbers:
In September, the Trump administration said it collected $31.3 billion in tariff revenue, $73 million below the August record. So far in 2025, the Treasury Department says the U.S. has collected $214.9 billion in tariff revenue.
Meanwhile:
The Supreme Court heard arguments last week over whether Trump’s trade policy is legal. Challengers say Trump is illegally using an emergency law to claim nearly limitless tariff power and American small businesses are paying the price.
We are learning that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is ‘very optimistic’ following Supreme Court discussions on the legality of tariffs imposed by the Trump administration. Sec. Bessent spoke with reporters outside the White House on a number of topics related to today’s Supreme Court arguments, including on the ongoing government shutdown.
The Source: Information in this article was taken from a Nov. 9, 2025, Truth Social post by President Trump and an ABC interview with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Background information was taken from previous FOX Television Station reportings. This story was reported from Detroit.