Key Takeaways:

• Millions of eligible children have been automatically enrolled in Trump Accounts, the Treasury Department says. 
• Claiming an account will require identity verification, proof of legal authority, and other information required by Treasury.
• Automatic enrollment does not automatically provide the $1,000 federal contribution available to certain eligible children.

The Treasury Department has automatically enrolled more than 60 million eligible children in Trump Accounts, a move intended to facilitate more philanthropic donations to the tax-advantaged investment vehicles for kids.¹

With automatic enrollment, eligible children under the age of 18 with a valid Social Security number now have a Trump Account, Treasury said in an Oct. 1 statement. However, parents, guardians, and other authorized individuals still must take steps to claim and access the accounts.²

The announcement comes one day after Treasury issued temporary regulations establishing auto enrollment and making other changes to Trump Accounts (also known as 530A accounts).³ 

The move to auto enrollment allows big philanthropic donations to reach Trump Accounts that hadn’t been opened.⁴ The regulations reference the $6.25 billion donation from the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation to children living in lower income zip codes.⁵ 

“The choices in the temporary regulations position class contributions to Trump Accounts for sustained participation by nonprofits and governments, both large and small,” the regulations say.

The Treasury rules will also allow stock donations to Trump Accounts by private donors in an effort to support large-scale giving.⁶

Read more: Trump Account for kids: Eligibility, government contribution, and limits

Claims process established

Trump Accounts are a custodial type of tax-advantaged traditional IRA. Families and others can contribute after-tax contributions up to $5,000 per year. Employers are also eligible to establish Trump Account contribution programs that would count against the $5,000 limit.

Eligible children born from 2025 through 2028 may also receive a one-time $1,000 federal contribution made to their Trump Account, if an election is made by an authorized individual. The federal seed money would not count toward the $5,000 limit. Similarly, other donor gifts from governments, charities, and others do not count toward the annual limit.⁷

Between 7 and 8 million children had been signed up by parents and other authorized individuals since the accounts officially launched on July 4, 2026, according to Treasury.⁸ 

The Oct. 1 move automatically enrolls other children who hadn’t been signed up — but it does not give parents or guardians access to the accounts. Even though an account was created, the U.S. Department of the Treasury's agent holds and administers the account as Trustee on the government's behalf.⁹

An individual seeking to claim an automatically enrolled account must independently submit information to Treasury to verify their identity, relationship to the child, review the child’s information, and accept the account terms.¹⁰

Treasury set up a help page to inform parents and guardians about the claims process. The process would go through the Trump Accounts app or the Trump Accounts web portal for users to provide required information and establish themselves as the responsible party.¹¹

Individual contributions and investments can’t be managed until an account is claimed and activated. Once the account is established, the person can view the account’s full history, manage contributions, and access statements and tax documents.¹²

Other claiming rules to know

There are several other important details to know about claiming an account, when the claims experience rolls out on the Trump Accounts app and web portal. They include:¹³

• Parents with multiple children can add and manage their accounts using the same app and login.
• If the claiming process isn’t completed, progress is saved so users can sign back in and continue.
• There’s no deadline to claim an account. Unclaimed accounts remain open and would convert to a traditional IRA in the child’s name at age 18.
• Even if an account was automatically created, you must still separately claim the account for your eligible child and elect to receive the $1,000 federal contribution.
• For separated co-parents who are both eligible to claim an account, the first to complete the process is granted control.  

Stock gifts and other changes

The temporary regulations also establish a framework for private donors to gift appreciated stock directly into Trump Accounts.  “Qualified stock contributions” would be limited to U.S. publicly traded companies, among other restrictions. For example, contributed stock generally must be held for the earlier of five years or the end of the growth period.¹⁴

This change is also designed to support “large-scale private giving” to support certain Trump Account beneficiaries, according to the regulations.¹⁵

The law that created Trump Accounts, commonly known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, restricts investment selections during the growth period to diversified, low-cost U.S. stock index funds and ETFs with annual expense ratios capped strictly below 0.10%.¹⁶

The temporary regulations say donated stock “does not violate this restriction because no funds in the account are used to acquire the contributed stock.” Instead, the stock would be contributed directly into the individual Trump Accounts for the beneficiaries.¹⁷