Treasury auto‑enrollment of 60 M children in Trump accounts – implementation timeline

The Department of the Treasury will begin the automatic enrollment of more than 60 million children into Trump Accounts on or about October 1, 2026 [4][5]. Temporary regulations released on September 29 by the Treasury and Internal Revenue Service remove the requirement for parents to manually opt-in via IRS Form 4547 or the program website [4][5]. The policy integrates account creation into the Social Security Administration’s birth registration process [3][5].

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated on September 15 that total participation is expected to reach 70 million within a month of the shift [5]. Current enrollment stands between 7 million and 8 million children [5][6]. While the accounts will be created automatically, parents must still take active steps to claim the $1,000 federal seed funding deposited into accounts for children born between 2025 and 2028 [3][4][5]. The Treasury has not yet fully detailed the process for parents to claim these accounts to add private or employer contributions [4].