The Trump White House has updated its projections of how much children could earn from the newly launched Trump Accounts after criticism that its previous calculations were meaningless.
Following the launch of the accounts on Wednesday, the Trump Accounts website revealed that investing $0 per year will result in a potential Trump Account recipient receiving $200,000 by age 55.
However, according to the Trump administration’s calculations, investing $250 a year during the same period would have left the recipient with just $192,000, less than if they had invested the money, the Daily Beast originally reported.
The Trump Accounts website shows that investing no money will give account holders a higher return than investing $250 a year. / trumpaccounts.gov
After Daily Beast reporting identified the discrepancies, the Trump Accounts website quietly updated its forecast for how much a newborn could earn with a Trump Account over a 55-year time span.
The website now states that investing no money in the account will return $243,000 for a Trump Account holder over a period of 55 years.
It goes on to say that investing $250 a year now yields $878,000, and that investing the maximum $5,000 a year will yield $13 million over 55 years—a staggering increase from the original forecast of $2.7 million.
The White House has quietly updated its projections for 55-year-old Trump Account holders. / trumpaccounts.gov
The website says the numbers are “derived from historical S&P 500 averages.”
The White House did not return The Daily Beast’s requests for comment on the various discrepancies.
A fact sheet from the Council of Economic Advisers outlines several return-on-investment scenarios for Trump Accounts. These figures for the most part do not appear to be what is currently on the Trump Accounts website.
Parents of children born between 2025 and 2028—the year Trump is supposed to leave office—are eligible to sign their children up for the bills. The bills come with an initial deposit of $1,000 funded by the federal government through Trump’s signature tax and spending legislation, the One Big Beautiful Bill.
Parents can sign their children up for accounts using the aptly named new IRS Form 4547. The accounts convert to traditional Roth IRAs when the child turns 18.
Officials in the Trump administration also seem unable to keep the numbers straight.
At a forum during the launch of the Trump Accounts, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said that investing a maximum of $5,000 a year in the accounts could yield $1.1 million by the age of 28.
Leavitt’s numbers were far greater than what the White House was advertising. / Win McNamee / Getty Images
But the website stated on Wednesday that by the age of 27, if the maximum is invested, the account will have $ 377,800. By Thursday, that estimate had risen sharply to $742,000.
The president himself claimed that by the time a Trump Account holder turns 18, “With every modest contribution, Trump Accounts should reach at least $50,000 in value.”
He also claimed that with “slightly larger contributions” the average Trump Account “will grow to $100,000, $200,000, and may even increase to more than $300,000 per child.”
The updated Trump Accounts website, however, says that with the contribution of $250 a year, the account will reach $19,000 by the age of 18.
The Trump White House quietly updated its projections overnight. / Win McNamee / Getty Images
Math has never been the Trump White House’s strong suit. The president often makes up numbers to sell his economic agenda.
Trump often claims that gas prices across the nation are below $2, a false claim that the president was called to his face this week.
Regarding drug prices, Trump claimed that his administration could reduce prices “1,000 percent, 600 percent, 500 percent, 1,500 percent,” since he claimed to use “certain talent” to reach “numbers that he didn’t even think could be reached.”