President Donald J. Trump made headlines in September when he promised to give $5,000 to every adult American citizen — but only if Republicans swept the midterms.
“I mean, I think there’s a little bit of, a little bit of we’ll cross that bridge when we get there,” said David Zervos, counselor to the Treasury Secretary, in an interview with the National News Desk. “There’s a variety of different ways you can look at skinning that cat and coming up with funding.”
Zervos said he wasn’t worried about funding the checks. And maybe he shouldn’t be; the midterm’s results are far from certain, but things aren’t looking great for Republicans in the midterms.
But Trump has made an expensive promise, and his already low 30% approval rate could sink even lower if he doesn’t follow through.
Zervos wasn’t able to give a specific plan to how the government would pay the checks off. But he did suggest it would take a few years.
“People have to recognize we are growing this economy this year, so far at 2.35% in the first half,” Zervos said to the National News Desk. “A percent on growth is a huge number.”
He says that 1% growth in the U.S. economy, which is worth around $32.5 trillion, gets you around $300 billion to $400 billion in extra revenue each year.
“Get that over a few years, the money starts to show up,” he said to the National News Desk.
It’s true that real GDP grew by 2.5% in Q1 2026 and 2.2% in Q2 2026. But the government doesn’t have access to the entire GDP. So far in 2026, the government has collected $4.85 trillion in revenue, which is around 15% of what the U.S.’ entire GDP is worth.
The U.S. Census Bureau says that there are around 245 million adult citizens in the U.S.. If each of them were to receive $5,000 in the mail, that would
