By Roy S. Johnson
Here’s one mantra I pounded into my children — one of many they’ll tell you, likely with an eyeroll and wink: Life is math.
Every decision has pluses and minuses, and while there are always nuances, if something doesn’t add up, it probably doesn’t.
So, do the math.
I was inspired to do the math this week after Alabama’s Republican Sens. Katie Britt and Tommy Tuberville, in a co-authored op-ed, declared that Donald Trump is “delivering” for Alabama. Their claim accompanied the announcement that the long-stunted $3.2 billion Mobile River Bridge and Bayway project, the most expensive undertaking in Alabama history, is “finally moving toward construction after 30 years of discussion, delay and doubt.”
“This is a major moment for Alabama,” they giddily wrote, all thanks to Trump.
What makes me laugh out loud is that Tuberville voted against the 2021 infrastructure bill that is funding the project. (As did every Republican member of the state’s congressional delegation that year.) So, all our senior senator is delivering, Alabamians, is nothing more than a wet presidential kiss.
As usual.
Now, I’m ecstatic for the people of Mobile, for folks whose commutes will be made easier when the bridge is constructed and the Bayway is widened in about five years.
Though to say Trump is “delivering” for Alabama is a bridge way too far.
The math just ain’t mathin’.
Let’s start with the nose-bleed-high cost of gas and food Alabamians and our fellow Americans are battling, thanks to Trump. Maybe prices will be lower by the time the bridge is complete — when Trump is long gone. But for now, Alabamians want deliverance.
And this: As of January more than 22,000 Alabamians no longer have health insurance through the Affordable Care Act, thanks to Trump and his manipulated minions in Congress. They refused to extend the enhanced tax credits that helped reduce the cost of health insurance but expired on Dec. 31 – all to pay for tax cuts for the rich.
Federal spending cuts and other rules mandated under Trump’s Big Awful Bill, passed last year, could deliver pain to the most vulnerable Alabamians.
About 678,000 people in the state – low-income and working families, people with disabilities and older residents — receive SNAP benefits, a federal food assistance program. As of March, participation had already dropped by almost 50,000 since January 2025, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, due to new work requirements under the bill. Moreover, the state might have to cover more than $200 million of SNAP costs, which were previously fully covered by the federal government, if Alabama can’t lower its 9.5% error rate.
“I’m all for helping people who have fallen on hard times, but SNAP has become overrun with fraud,” Tuberville told AL.com in a statement last month. “Some people who are on the rolls need to get off their butts and go back to work.”
The guy who wants to be governor sure knows how to deliver — without evidence or empathy.
I’ll acknowledge this “delivery,” courtesy of the president: Trump accounts. Acknowledge with a caveat.
The savings vehicles were announced recently by the administration as a means of building wealth for our kids. Babies born between Jan. 1, 2025, and Dec. 31, 2028 — yes, “Trump babies, birthed while he’s in office — are eligible to receive $1,000 from the federal government. Others under 18 are eligible for the accounts, too, but not the seed funds. Once the child turns 18, the money may be used for anything.
Saving for a child’s future from the moment they leave the womb is a plan every young parent should pursue. Here’s the rub: The accounts are not the panacea the administration hails them to be. While the money grows tax-free, withdrawals are taxed as ordinary income — unlike 529s, whose distributions may be used tax-free for educational costs.
We had 529s for both of our children; it allowed them to graduate from college pretty much debt-free. That’s true delivery, a graduation gift for a lifetime.
Finally, here’s where the math truly tips – heavily in Trump’s favor: In 2025, the first year of Trump’s second term, he earned $2.2 billion in income from various ventures, according to a 927-page disclosure. That’s more than 250 percent higher than the $622 million he reported in 2024.
More than half of those earnings ($1.4 billion) were from crypto, the quirky financial space that is wholly dependent on government regulation (or non-regulation). Trump made it clear well before he won a second term that he would be crypto’s friend.
Now, we know why.
The disclosure reported $635 million in royalties from $TRUMP meme coin sales, as well as $500 million from a partially family-owned cryptocurrency firm.
The BBC did the math, reporting Trump’s crypto earnings at $1,430,390,415. Remember that number.
Now, grab a pencil: While the rapacious president profited from the meme coin, more than a million bless-their-heart investors in it lost $3.81 billion, according to Nansen, a cryptocurrency analytics firm.
Do the math. Thanks to Trump, America is in the red. Pun definitely intended.