President Donald Trump has been dangling cash in front of the American public in the form of a $2,000 “tariff dividend.” And of course, the big question everyone’s asking is: When are these checks supposed to show up?
Trump has been hyping the idea of handing out payments as a kind of financial thank-you for the years of tariffs collected under his administration. The promise stirred plenty of buzz, and plenty of confusion.
According to Trump, the cash could land in Americans’ bank accounts “by the middle of next year, a little bit later than that,” though he offered almost no concrete details.
“We’ve taken in hundreds of billions of dollars in tariff money. We’re going to be issuing dividends,” he said in Novemeber, adding that the payouts would be aimed at “low, moderate and middle incomes.”
So who actually gets the $2,000?
For now, there’s no official plan, no government forms, and no set rules.
But one well-known commentator says the criteria might be much simpler than people expect.
Social Security analyst and YouTuber Blind to Billionaire believes income alone could decide everything.
“It is based on your income — that’s it. I’ll make it very clear here, is your income below $75,000 a year, as an individual, yes or no? That’s it — that’s all you need to know. If your answer is yes, you are most likely eligible for this,” he explained.
He noted that similar income cutoffs were used for prior federal relief efforts:
“Generally, the threshold they put in place for income is $75,000 as an individual, $150,000 as a married couple.”
That means people who are unemployed or earning money outside traditional jobs might still qualify. But the big catch remains: nothing has been formally approved.
