No, the June 2025 Federal Budget Surplus Was Not the First in 20 Years
By Jack Olson
What happened: Conservative social media users are falsely claiming that President Donald Trump achieved the first monthly federal government surplus in 20 years in June 2025, celebrating the supposedly rare achievement as proof that Trump's tariffs and other economic policies have been successful.
Context: On July 11, the Treasury Department’s Bureau of the Fiscal Service reported that the federal government had a surplus of $27 billion in June 2025.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, the surplus was bolstered by increased customs duties, decreased spending, and some timing quirks because June 1 fell on a Sunday, so first-of-the-month June payments went out in May. Without this timing issue, the CBO estimates June 2025 would have shown a $71 billion deficit.
A closer look: Conservative social media users claimed in posts that received millions of views that Trump’s policies were the reason for what many called the “historic” surplus.
Pro-Trump X user @ExxAlerts said in a July 11 post, “BREAKING: For the first time in 20 YEARS, The United States Government has reported a BUDGET SURPLUS.” The post received 1 million views and 22,000 likes in four days.
Conservative X user @OpenSourceZone repeated the claim in a July 11 post, stating, “Breaking: US Posts its first June budget surplus in 20 years Per Treasury Report.” The post was shared by White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Stephen Miller, garnering 361,000 views and 4,900 likes in four days.
Actually: The U.S. government ran a monthly budget surplus just two months earlier, in April 2025, and also did so six times during the Biden administration alone, according to official Treasury Department data.
Indeed, seven other June surpluses have been recorded since 2005 — in 2006, 2007, 2008, 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016, during the Bush and Obama administrations, federal reports show.
Monthly surpluses are often the result of quirks in the timing of cash flowing into the government from taxes collections. The last annual federal budget surplus occurred in 2001.
NewsGuard sent an email to the White House press office requesting comment on Miller’s reposting of the false claim and inquiring whether he intended to correct the record but did not receive a response.
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