Trump Promises Another Round Of Checks Before The Midterms

President Donald Trump on Friday announced plans to send "nearly $100" checks to more than 20 million seniors on Medicare, his latest pledge to send voters money before a critical slate of midterm elections in November.

“I pledged to protect and preserve Medicare and Social Security, which were on the verge of RUIN by Joe Biden, who foolishly and maliciously let tens of millions of Illegal Aliens into our Country, and we are doing just that for America’s Seniors,” he wrote in a post on Truth Social. The checks, Trump said, would “help pay for their Medicare Part B premiums.” Funding would come from the Medicare Improvement Fund, which the president panned as “a pointless ‘Slush Fund’ that has only been used by Dumocrats in Congress to pay for the Waste, Fraud, and Abuse for their Special Interest friends, and drive up Healthcare costs.”

The Medicare Improvement Fund was established in 2008 to allow for general improvements to the health insurance program and make periodic adjustments to payments for suppliers and health care providers. Money from the fund is generally appropriated by Congress, and not given out by presidential fiat.

“With this action, President Trump is the first President to ever use the Medicare Improvement Fund to directly lower costs for senior citizens,” the White House wrote in a fact sheet Friday. The White House announcement specified that the checks would be a one-time payment of $90, which Trump separately wrote would go out "immediately."

This is far from the first time the president has promised voters money. At the Republican midterm convention last month, Trump pledged a $5,000 “Trump dividend” to every adult U.S. citizen if Republicans retain both the House and the Senate, a promise he repeated in his post late Friday. The proposal would cost well over $1 trillion and has not been approved by Congress.

But the president on Friday said the new checks were proof he was serious about the Trump dividends if Republicans sweep the midterms.

“Because I delivered on this very important issue for the American People, they can also rest assured the highly popular $5,000 Trump Dividend will be distributed to every U.S. Citizen if, and when, the Republicans win the Midterm Elections!,” he wrote.

Last November, he promised tariff-funded dividend checks of at least $2,000 for low- and middle-income Americans and later said the payments would arrive around the middle of 2026. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the plan would require congressional legislation, which has not materialized.

Trump also entertained a separate proposal early in his second term to distribute $5,000 “DOGE dividend” checks drawn from potential savings found by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency. That proposal never became law.