For months, Trump has touted a plan to give Americans a "tariff dividend" refund. With the start of the new year, Americans wonder if they should expect a $2,000 check.
In early November, the president again floated the idea of issuing $2,000 payouts to "middle-income people and lower-income people" from the collected tariff revenues.
"Next year is projected to be the largest tax refund season ever, and we're going to be giving back refunds out of the tariffs, as we have taken in literally trillions of dollars," Trump said during a Dec. 2 cabinet meeting. "We're going to be giving a nice dividend to the people in addition to reducing debt."
But experts have said that tariff revenue likely won't cover the cost of issuing such checks.
In September, the Treasury Department said it had generated $195 billion in tariff-related revenue. The Bipartisan Policy Center calculated $194.9 billion in net tariff revenue in 2025, which would come up short of the estimated $300 billion cost of sending the checks.
