'Gang behavior': Hawley slammed for proposal to restrict $600 rebate to 'our people'

31 July

Josh Hawley campaigning at the Jackson Egg Farm in Jackson, Missouri in August 2018, Wikimedia Commons

Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) says new legislation he proposes will direct $600 tariff rebate checks to Americans — but not to “Biden voters,” only to “Trump blue-collar voters,” reports The Independent.

“Well, you wouldn’t give it to everybody, you’d give it to the working people,” Hawley told right-wing podcaster and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon on Tuesday. “You’d give it to our people. …I mean, you know, the rich people don’t need it … what I mean by that is all those Democrat donors of Wall Street, all these hedge fund guys, who all hate the tariffs, by the way.”

Hawley told Bannon that the nation is “on track to raise over $150 billion from tariff revenues this year alone,” which economists say comes from U.S. businesses and consumers' pocketbooks. He submitted the American Worker Rebate Act of 2025 in July to offset those consumer payouts. But his bill includes a phase-out for incomes exceeding $75,000 for singles and $150,000 for joint filers.

Social media pounced Hawley’s proposal to direct money away from “Biden voters”.

Hey [Hawley], I'll be happy to donate that $600 to your opponent next election. Especially since I, like nobody in America, voted for Joe Biden in 2024,” said one commenter on X, pointing out that former VP Kamala Harris ran on the Democratic ticket last year, not Biden.

Republicans Against Trump also slammed the move on X, asking “How is this even legal?”

“Also, rebate checks?” they added. “I was reliably told that other countries pay the tariffs.”

“This isn’t governance. It’s gang behavior,” said another critic on X. “… You don’t get to weaponize federal funds to reward political loyalty. That’s straight out of the authoritarian playbook. And let’s not forget: they lied for years saying ‘China pays the tariffs.’ Now they’re admitting Americans are footing the bill then acting like handing some of that money back is a gift?”

Still another critic called the $600 checks “insulting,” and criticized Republicans for passing a budget bill this year that sends “85 percent of $4.8 trillion as far away from 'blue collar' voters as you could possibly get.”

Read the Independent report at this link.

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