Trump Accounts for Children: Who Gets $1,000 and How to Claim

Your child gets the $1,000 if he or she was born between January 1, 2025, and December 31, 2028, is a U.S. citizen, has a Social Security number, and a parent or guardian elects the deposit. Treasury already opened a Trump Account on October 1, 2026, for children under 18 with an SSN, so for most families the work now is claiming that account, and the claim is where you elect the $1,000. Today, open the Trump Accounts app, start the claim for each child and tick the $1,000 box before you submit. Most claims clear within a few business days.

Who gets the $1,000 and who gets the account only

Any child with a valid SSN who will not turn 18 before the end of the year the account opens can have a Trump Account. The $1,000 adds a birth-year window and U.S. citizenship:

The SSN has to be valid for work and issued before the election.

The election comes from someone who expects the child to be his or her qualifying child for that tax year, typically a parent or guardian. Each child gets one $1,000: Treasury pays on the first election it processes and ignores any later one. A proposed IRS rule published in March 2026, not yet final, opens the election on the day your child qualifies and closes it on December 31 of the year your child turns 17.

How claiming and the election work

An account Treasury opened sits with Treasury's agent until it is claimed: nobody sees the balance, donor gifts can still arrive, and money from family and employers plus the $1,000 waits for a claim.

The claim form is the electronic version of IRS Form 4547, Trump Account Election(s). It goes to the IRS, which usually processes it in 1 to 3 business days. Treasury deposits the $1,000 as soon as it can confirm with the trustee that the account is open.

For an account Treasury opened, filing the form first settles nothing: the first authorized adult to activate it, which includes signing the account agreement, becomes the responsible party who manages it. Until someone activates, another parent or guardian can still file a claim, and after that, later attempts for that child are blocked. If a Form 4547 opened the account, the person in its Part I manages it. Claims have no deadline: an unclaimed account stays open and invested until your child takes it over at 18.

What to do today

1. Gather the details. For you: legal name as it reads on your Social Security card, SSN or ITIN, date of birth, mobile number, email and home address with county. For each child: legal name, SSN and date of birth exactly as Social Security has them. Get the county right, because some donor gifts go to every child in a named county.
2. Open the official app or site. Download Trump Accounts from the App Store or Google Play, type trumpaccount.com into Chrome, Safari, Firefox or Edge on a computer, or file through your IRS Individual Online Account after verifying with ID.me. Go there directly instead of tapping a link in a message.
3. Start the claim. The app finds the account Treasury opened and claims it; if none exists, the same form opens one. Add a second child with the plus sign under Add Another Child. A third child needs a new form.
4. Tick the pilot program election box for each child who meets the $1,000 conditions above, then sign by typing your legal first and last name. Continue straight to identity verification, because the form saves nothing before that step.
5. Activate the day the email arrives. When the IRS approves the claim, an email and an in-app notice bring you back; sign in with the same username and password and finish activation. To add money, link a bank account (transfers take up to 5 business days) or a debit card. For relatives, tap the QR code icon next to your child's name and choose Share link.

Where it splits

If you filed Form 4547 with your 2025 tax return, Treasury started sending activation emails in May 2026. Search your inbox for one from the Treasury address listed under Protections and activate from it. If nothing came, start the claim in the app as in step 3. If you left the $1,000 box blank on that return, submit a new claim form in the app with the box ticked.

If the IRS rejects the claim, you get an email and an IRS notice by mail, such as Notice CP318, also posted under Notices and letters in your IRS Online Account. The notice names the exact problem and the next step. The common cause is a name, birth date or SSN that differs from your tax return or Social Security's records: correct a typo on the form, and report any name change from marriage or divorce to Social Security before you file again. Then resubmit the claim form in the app. Form 1040-X plays no part in this fix, and IRS phone representatives have no power to change an election.

If your child's other parent controls the account but you meet the qualifying-child rule above, elect the $1,000 on a paper Form 4547. Fill in Part I and all of Part II except line 6, tick line 7 in Part III, and sign by hand; a typed or electronic signature is invalid on paper. Mail it to the address IRS.gov/PaperReturns lists for your return when you are not enclosing a payment. Electing for a child who is someone else's qualifying child carries a $500 penalty when careless and $1,000 when fraudulent.

If your child was born 2016 through 2024, look in the claimed account for $250 from Michael and Susan Dell. Their gift was deposited automatically in October 2026, with no application, to children born in those years in ZIP codes with a median family income of about $117,300 or less, to children on military bases, and to some children above that line whose families signed up before automatic enrollment. Money for children in foster care is set aside and expected in 2027.

What the account allows once you claim it

• Contributions: up to $5,000 a year per child from parents, relatives, friends and employers combined, rising with inflation after 2027. They stop after December 31 of the year your child turns 17, which for a child born in 2009 means December 31, 2026. The $1,000 and donor gifts sit outside the cap.
• Employer money: the law lets an employer put in up to $2,500 a year tax-free for a worker or the worker's dependents. The program lists employer deposits as coming soon, with no start date, and the IRS rules for them are still proposed.
• Investment: every dollar goes into SPYM, an index fund that tracks the S&P 500, usually within one business day, so the first balance you see sits above or below what went in. More choices are planned for claimed accounts.
• Cost: claiming, holding and contributing are free. The fund's own expenses are capped at 0.1% of the balance a year.
• Withdrawals: locked until January 1 of the year your child turns 18. From then on traditional IRA rules apply: money taken out for college costs or a first home (up to $10,000 lifetime) avoids the 10% early-withdrawal tax, family contributions come back tax-free, and earnings, the $1,000 and employer money are taxed as ordinary income.

Protections and where to push

• The $1,000 arrives in full. By law it skips the offsets that take tax refunds for past-due child support, federal agency debts, state income tax debts and unemployment compensation debts, and Treasury never applies it to federal taxes you owe.
• The program call center, 866-USA-4547 (866-872-4547), and the app's chat answer every day from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Eastern, except stock market holidays. Call there to change your details after claiming or to report a claim made without your permission, and read any IRS notice that follows.
• SSI stays protected through childhood. The account counts as zero toward the SSI resource limit until January 1 of the year your child turns 18; from that date it is a countable resource.
• Real messages come from known addresses. The first activation email comes only from no-reply@TrumpAccounts.Treasury.gov; later ones come in the app or from addresses ending in @trumpaccount.com. Treasury and its providers never ask for passwords or one-time codes.

Call script when the claim is blocked

"I'm calling about my child's Trump Account. I am [your name], [parent / legal guardian] of [child's name], born [date of birth]. The claim shows [ineligible / already claimed by someone else / stuck since date]. Nobody else has my permission to claim this account. What is my next step to become the responsible party, and how do I elect the $1,000 if another adult is?"

Today

1. Pull your SSN and each child's Social Security card.
2. Claim each child's account in the app.
3. Tick the $1,000 box for each eligible child.

Next comes the activation email. Once you activate, the $1,000 follows for each child you elected it for.