• Treasury Secretary suggests Americans might save rebate checks to avoid inflationary impact
• Fox News host turns tables on official who blamed Biden spending for demand shock
• Trump promises dividend payments as Republicans face backlash over affordability crisis

WASHINGTON, D.C. (TDR) — Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent struggled to answer whether President Donald Trump‘s proposed $2,000 tariff rebate checks would be inflationary during a Tuesday night interview on Fox News, after spending much of the segment blaming government spending for creating demand shocks that drive up prices.

Bret Baier, host of Special Report, asked Bessent whether the rebate payments would trigger the same inflationary pressures the Treasury Secretary had just attributed to the Biden administration’s spending policies. “Would a two thousand-dollar tariff dividend check going to people be inflationary?” Baier asked.

Baier: Would a $2,000 dividend check be inflationary?

Bessent: Maybe we can persuade Americans to save that. pic.twitter.com/DwPI1nHvqg

— Acyn (@Acyn) November 18, 2025

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Bessent hesitated before responding. “Well there are a lot of things that are gonna happen next year,” he said. When pressed again, Bessent acknowledged “that could be one of ’em” before pivoting to suggest the administration might “persuade Americans to save that” rather than spend it.

Tariffs blamed for election losses

The exchange highlighted the political and economic challenges facing the Trump administration as tariff policies have drawn criticism for contributing to inflation that became a central issue in this month’s elections. Democrats swept major gubernatorial races in Virginia and New Jersey by focusing campaigns on affordability and rising consumer prices.

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Current inflation stands at 3%, up from 2.3% in April when Trump began implementing sweeping tariff increases. Research from Harvard economist Alberto Cavallo found inflation would have been 2.2% without the tariffs. The Tax Foundation estimates Trump’s import taxes will add $1,600 annually to average household costs.

“They had a demand shock induced by this massive wave of government overspending,” Bessent told Baier, referring to the Biden administration. “But to make it worse, they had this huge regulatory buildup. So demand shock and supply constraint, that’s a recipe for this inflation.”

Rebate plan faces skepticism

Trump announced plans for the tariff dividend payments on social media, claiming revenue from import taxes would fund checks of “at least $2000 a person” for middle and lower-income Americans. The proposal requires congressional approval, and support among lawmakers has been tepid.

According to the Yale Budget Lab, a one-time $2,000 payment would cost $450 billion even with income caps, while the Treasury Department reports collecting $195 billion in customs duties for fiscal year 2025. The plan would face a significant funding shortfall based on current tariff revenues.

Bessent told Fox News last week that “we need legislation for that,” acknowledging Congress must act before any checks could be distributed. In August, he told CNBC the administration was “laser-focused” on paying down the national debt before considering dividend payments.

Yale Budget Lab analysis found any inflationary effects from the rebates would likely be limited, estimating inflation would increase by less than 0.1% annually. However, the proposal comes as Trump faces criticism for denying the severity of the affordability crisis affecting millions of Americans.

Trump accounts for newborns

During the Baier interview, Bessent also promoted a separate initiative called “Trump accounts,” which would provide $1,000 government-funded investment accounts for every child born between 2025 and 2028. The funds would be invested in the stock market, with children able to access the money at age 18.

“They’re gonna learn the power of compounding, and there’s gonna be a lot of financial literacy around that,” Bessent said. “I think the reason that we saw kind of the disastrous election in New York is young people don’t feel like they have a stake in the economy, so we wanna give ’em a stake in the economy.”

The Trump accounts program, included in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed in July, allows parents to contribute up to $5,000 annually to each child’s account. Bessent previously described the initiative as “a backdoor for privatizing Social Security,” though he later walked back those comments amid criticism from Democrats and Social Security advocacy groups.

Supreme Court weighing tariff legality

The fate of Trump’s sweeping tariff policies currently rests with the Supreme Court, which heard arguments earlier this month on whether the president exceeded his authority by imposing import taxes on virtually all foreign goods. Lower courts have found Trump’s use of a 1970s economic emergency statute to justify the tariffs goes too far.

The administration maintains tariffs are essential to American prosperity, arguing in court briefs that “with tariffs, we are a rich nation; without tariffs, we are a poor nation.” Critics contend the import taxes are essentially a tax on American consumers that businesses pass along through higher retail prices.

After Tuesday’s exchange, Baier moved to other topics as Bessent predicted inflation would curve downward in the first and second quarters of next year, with real income growth accelerating as Americans see the benefits of increased investment.

Should the government send stimulus-style rebate checks funded by tariff revenue?

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