The end of 2025 was plagued by headlines of surging prices, job cuts, and the Epstein scandal. Faced with record-low approval ratings from all sides of the political spectrum, Trump knew just the thing to cut across the mass discontent: a $2,000 check, straight into the pocket of every (non-high-income) American. If it worked in 2020, what could go wrong this time?
The country waited with bated breath for Trump to unveil the checks at a December press conference. Instead, workers experienced Trump’s signature move: a disappointing bait and switch. The $2,000 checks had been downgraded to $1,776—and they would only be paid to active military service members.
So what happened? Trump had hyped the $2,000 as a “tariff dividend,” with the money coming exclusively from increased import duties. Unfortunately for him, the math didn’t add up. Such a dividend could cost over $300 billion, far more than the tariff income of roughly $120 billion at that point in the year. It would be impossible to send out the checks without further austerity or without adding to the public debt.
Enter the “warrior dividend,” a pathetic attempt to save face that pays out just over one million checks—versus 200 million-plus. But even these $1,776 checks don’t come from tariff revenues: they’re paid out of an already existing military housing subsidy approved by Congress last summer. Trump is stealing from the poor to give to the poor!
After this debacle, it’s no wonder that when asked about his promise to deliver the $2,000 dividends, Trump responded: “I did that? When did I do that?”
No amount of robbing Peter to pay Paul can right the sinking ship of American capitalism. Even if the ruling class could afford to give out stimulus checks, it wouldn’t be enough to meaningfully address the economic woes faced by workers. What does $2,000 do when the average consumer debt in America is $104,755? At best, it could provide some temporary relief. But this is like pasting a Band-Aid over a gaping, infected wound.
The only way to permanently put an end to the economic crisis is to cut out the rot at its core: overthrow capitalism with socialist revolution!