Trump: Free $5,000 for Everyone!

Sometimes we watch the political circus on the other side of the ocean from Europe with mounting astonishment. At a rally in Dallas, Donald Trump made a striking promise: every adult American gets $5,000 if the Republicans keep their majority in Congress.

Trump calls this generous payout the “Trump dividend”, a reward for the country’s economic success. The idea that a president is going to make everyone rich single-handedly by simply handing out cheques sounds like a dream, of course. But behind this generous Santa Claus act lies a hefty dose of political opportunism and corruption.

Open corruption with a bow on top?

While Trump presents it as a business dividend from a successful country, critics, economists and politicians simply call the plan a political bribe and election buying. After all, under US federal election law (18 U.S.C. § 597) it is illegal to offer money or anything of value in exchange for votes.

Tying a federal payout of well over a trillion dollars directly to a specific election result stretches the legal and ethical limits of democracy considerably.

Why he can never keep this promise

Before American voters go and order their new yacht, there is one small problem: Trump cannot keep this promise at all, legally or economically.

1. No constitutional power: Under the Appropriations Clause of the US Constitution, a president has no authority to just hand out money. Only the US Congress decides on approving and allocating government budgets. Even if his party wins, the president does not automatically get a bag of money to hand out.
2. An unaffordable hole: Paying out $5,000 to roughly 245 million adults is estimated to cost $1.2 to $1.35 trillion. Vice President J.D. Vance suggested that tariff revenues could cover this, but that revenue falls far short of such an enormous amount.
3. Hyperinflation looming: Economist Peter Schiff warned that printing money for this gigantic payout will lead to an enormous wave of inflation. Instead of everyone getting rich, groceries and petrol simply become unaffordable.

Big promises, small print

Making big promises that cannot be kept: it is a well-known phenomenon in American politics and the tech world.

The “Trump dividend” is therefore above all a campaign slogan. No law, no budget, no funding. What there is: a president tying a payout of more than a trillion dollars to an election result. That is not an economic plan, but a round of bidding.

From Europe we watch with a mixture of astonishment and recognition. This is what we in the Netherlands call a free-beer motion: a proposal everyone is in favour of, for exactly as long as nobody has to explain who pays the bill.