Chapter 1: What did Trump promise regarding $2000 in tariff dividends?
Well, howdy there internet people, it's Belle again. So today, we're going to talk about Trump promising $2,000 in tariff dividends. During a wonderful weekend day of posting on social media, where the president made all sorts of wonderful and totally normal statements, Trump declared that everybody would be getting a couple thousand dollars as what he called a dividend from the tariffs.
Sunday morning, people on social media started celebrating the certainly inbound checks.
Chapter 2: How did social media react to Trump's announcement?
I wondered if this would be like the Doge dividends and wondered if they realized that for most people, the two grand wouldn't fully offset the cost of the tariffs that most will end up absorbing. But moving on.
Specifically, Trump posted a bunch of, let's just call them whimsical claims about the economy, and said that people who oppose tariffs are fools, and then, in relevant part, said, quote, a dividend of at least $2,000 a person, not including high-income people, will be paid to everyone. Well, obviously, this time it's for real, Charlie Brown. No moving of the football on this one.
He said at least $2,000.
Chapter 3: What are the implications of Trump's tariff dividend claims?
Everybody celebrate that amazing news. This just in. Treasury Secretary Scott Besant said, quote, The $2,000 dividend could come in lots of forms, in lots of ways. It could be just the tax decreases that we are seeing on the President's agenda. No tax on tips. No tax on overtime. No tax on Social Security. Deductibility on auto loans.
Wow, that doesn't sound anything like what Trump seemed to be saying in his post.
Chapter 4: How did Treasury Secretary Scott Bessette clarify the dividend proposal?
Does that mean there won't be any checks? It's exactly like the Doge checks? The football moved again. That was completely unexpected. So many non-gullible people believed him. Trump's claims didn't even last a full day before his administration was walking it back.
As time went on, it became clear from the right-wing spin machine that Besson's statement was being used to wash Trump's claim and imply Trump was saying that the tax cuts already in law would be providing the dividends. In completely unrelated news, while Besson was on This Week on ABC, the host asked, quote,
The president also came forward with a new proposal overnight, saying it's time instead to do away with Obamacare and said to have the money go directly to the people.
Do you have a formal proposal to do that?
Chapter 5: What is the overall impact of Trump's announcements on public perception?
Bessette replied with, quote, we don't have a formal proposal.
So, we have dividends that aren't dividends and proposals that aren't proposals and a continuing slide into meaningless announcements meant to get a headline and convince the MAGA base that they're working for them. Fun times. Anyway, it's just a thought. Y'all have a good day.