The young conservative movement post-Charlie Kirk
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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One year ago today, conservative activist Charlie Kirk was gunned down in Utah. Today, we're going to check in with conservative youth movement, how they're coping, and where they go from here. It's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Miles Parks. I cover voting.
I'm Elena Moore. I cover politics. And I'm Mara Liason, senior national political correspondent.
And before we do dive into our main topic here, Mara, during this first ever Republican midterm convention last night, President Trump made a pretty notable new pitch. Seems like a novel way to get voters.
If the Republicans win the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, both of them, because of our economic, tremendous economic success, like in history we've never had anything like what's happening, but because of our tremendous strength and success economically, I will issue a dividend to every adult citizen in the United States of America for $5,000.
I feel like the first question that comes to my mind when I saw this this morning was like the same one that comes up a lot with Trump is like, can he do this, Mara?
Sure. You mean, can he promise to give everybody $5,000?
I mean, is it literally legal? I don't
know. Mara, make it make sense. It's
legal to make a campaign promise. That's all he's doing. He's saying, if my party wins both houses of Congress, I will issue $5,000 checks to everyone. Now, $5,000 checks to every adult in America would be $1.3 trillion. That's a lot of money. Whether he could actually do this without congressional approval is a whole other question. But this is very similar to someone saying, if I am elected, I will issue everyone a COVID check or a tax cut.
It's
no different from any campaign promise. And what's interesting about it is that Donald Trump's approval rating has dropped dramatically because he hasn't. fulfilled his campaign promises. And now he's making another one. We'll see how credible it is to voters.
That's what I was going to ask.
What was President Trump’s $5,000 dividend proposal and why did it dominate the midterm convention?
He's like, does this move the political needle? Do you think, Elena? I mean, is any thoughts on whether this is going to matter this year?
I mean, the first thing I thought about is, yeah, exactly what Mara said. This is a big campaign promise, but Trump is not on the ballot again, which is also something to keep in mind. You know, this midterm election, obviously he's not on the ballot, but, you know, symbolically he is. You know, the midterms are often a referendum of the sitting president, so you can argue he kind of is on the ballot. But after this midterms, he really isn't. And so I'm kind of curious, I mean, what the White House even sees as the repercussions here on really making sure this pans out.
Well, one of the things this does tell us is that as many times as Trump disparages affordability as an issue, they understand that it is the top issue
for
voters. And this promise of $5,000 checks to everyone is a way that they can show they recognize that affordability is an issue. They don't want to address it directly because he said it's a myth. But they know that this is what voters care about.
It's also once again, just like a very tangible promise, which we know that that really resonates with voters on both sides of the aisle. I mean, the amount of voters who would tell me on the campaign trail for former President Biden, oh, he's going to forgive my student loans or, you know, Trump voters who said no tax on tips. Like these are very tangible promises and that can go a long way for someone.
But I guess I mean, President Trump has promised people money a lot of different times in his second term. Right. I mean, he promised people some sort of checks after the Doge cuts. I remember he promised tariff refunds at one point. I guess I'm just wondering. And people haven't seen money from either of those two other instances. When the average voter hears about a promise like that, do you think they engage with it like, oh, like this is actually going to happen?
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–2:16
2
What was President Trump’s $5,000 dividend proposal and why did it dominate the midterm convention?
2:16–6:04
3
Is the $5,000 check promise legally feasible and how might it affect voter perceptions?
6:04–10:49
4
How are young conservatives feeling about the Republican Party two years after Charlie Kirk’s death?
10:49–18:07