Trump and JD Vance are hot on the midterm campaign trail trying to convince voters that “sick” people, meaning Democrats, minorities and immigrants, are ‘everywhere,’ “stealing American taxpayers’ money.” To sell the claim, Trump recently assembled MAGA supporters for a rage-filled rant at the Oval Office where he unveiled his new snitch-for-hire program.
Claiming with a straight face that America is being plundered by thieves and scammers rather than Trump’s wealthy CEOs with government subsidies, Trump wants to pay snitches for dirt on their poor neighbors and coworkers under his new “fraud whistleblower incentive program.”
One entertaining lowlight of the Oval Office announcement was Stephen Miller screeching in a high pitched voice that “refugees, illegal aliens and foreigners” who “came to this country to loot and plunder us” are “now buying Mercedes, buying BMWs and flying first class,” while, “You paid for every parking ticket you ever had.”
As he performed for Fox News, Miller also insisted that foreigners are funding Democrats’ midterm campaigns, as millions of murderers pour into the country to “pillage” from middle-class Americans, because, “That’s. What. The. Democrat. Party. Did. To. You!” One hopes Miller’s lust for power will pop the veins in his neck.
The Red Scare redux
Under the new $25 million fraud whistleblower fund, Americans who snitch on their families, friends and neighbors with ‘fraud’ tips leading to prosecution will receive large financial rewards. As to payments, Trump announced, “I will be the arbitrator of all of these decisions. I (alone) will determine whether or not the person is deserving.”
It’s a paid informant program that parallels America’s ugly Red Scare of the 1950s, when Senator Joseph McCarthy paid informants to target and blackball suspected communists. It also models Hitler’s Gestapo, which was premised on an expansive network of paid and volunteer government informants.
By claiming the sole power to be the “arbitrator” of disputed claims, Trump is politicizing and delegitimizing his program from the jump. The project has already showcased the payment of $10,000 to Nick Shirley, whose viral video falsely accused childcare centers in Minnesota’s Somali community of not serving children. Despite Shirley’s payment, state inspectors found those centers operating as required during unannounced audits,which confirms that rewarding viral accusations will encourage unfounded tips and the continued political targeting of certain communities.
A fraud program meant to deflect from Trump’s own economic malfeasance
Purring in agreement with Stephen Miller, pointing fingers at everyone else during the Oval Office fraud confab,Vance announced, “To Americans everywhere: your tax dollars are being stolen.” Vance is right. American tax dollars arebeing stolen. They’re being stolen by Trump, his wealthy donors and his corporate CEOs.
Setting aside the outrageous graft, pay to play, crypto schemes, emoluments and self dealing that costs taxpayers billions, Trump has amassed the largest peace-time deficit relative to GDP in our nation’s history.The exploding national debt under Trump rose by a staggering $7.8 trillion during the first Trump administration, ranking “as the third-biggest increase, relative to the size of the economy, of any U.S. presidential administration…” This year, our national debt jumped past $37 trillion, despite draconian program cuts nationwide, thanks to Republicans’$4.5 trillion in tax gifts to the rich combined with Trump’s out of control spending on Iran, ICE and his new police state.
This debt is not sustainable, and translates directly into higher inflation, which means US taxpayers are now paying more interest. Annual net interest payments on U.S. federal debt exceeded $1 trillion for the first time in 2025, equal to about 14 percent of total federal outlays, exceeding defense spending by about $150 billion.
The outlook for the interest burden of the debt over the next decade has steadily worsened, with Forbes projecting that the U.S. Treasury will spend $20 trillion in interest on the national debt—roughly $200 billion a month by 2036— funds that won’t be available for health care, defense, food, education, roads or FEMA.
Trump has spent $47 billion and climbing on a war in Iran that he can’t win, and has cost every American household over $1,700 through his economically illiterate tariffs alone. Under Republicans’ Big Rapacious Bill, Trump’s immigrant crackdown and police state cost more than the yearly budget for all local and state law enforcement agencies combined across the entire United States.
Trump has bastardized the nation’s former economic power and turned the US into a kleptocracy that serves Republican donors as prescribed in the right wing Project 2025. Trump, Vance and Miller are busting a vein to push voters into hating and blaming each other as a ruse to disguise their own conduct and protect the nation’s richest 1%.
Here’s hoping enough voters get it; the midterms are not about left vs. right. It’s about Trump and his wealthy donors vs. everyone else.
Sabrina Haake is a political analyst and 25+ year federal trial attorney specializing in 1st and 14th Amendment defense. She writes the free Substack, The Haake Take.