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President Biden’s Treasury Department is exploring ways to speed up the process of adding Harriet Tubman’s portrait to the forefront of the $ 20 bill after the Trump administration dropped the Obama-era initiative, a White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Monday.
The decision to replace Andrew Jackson with Ms Tubman as the face of the $ 20 bill was made in 2016 by then Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew. President Donald J. Trump opposed the idea and his Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has stopped working on this part of the currency overhaul, saying adding new security features to the money was a more urgent priority. Mr Mnuchin said the banknotes with the new images could not go into circulation until 2028 and that a future Treasury secretary would make the call if Jackson was to be replaced.
The Treasury Department, which Biden has appointed as head of Janet L. Yellen, plans to accelerate that timeline.
“The Treasury Department is taking action to resume its efforts to put Harriet Tubman on the front of the new $ 20 bills,” Ms. Psaki said. “It is important that our money reflects the history and diversity of our country.”
Mr. Trump claimed to be an Andrew Jackson fan, a populist colleague, and was a staunch opponent of altering historical images and statues.
Mr Mnuchin’s decision to slow down the change drew backlash from some Congressional Democrats and sparked an investigation by the Treasury Inspector General into whether the process faced inappropriate political interference. The investigation did not reveal any wrongdoing on the part of Mr. Mnuchin.
According to Mr Lew’s plan, the new design was supposed to be unveiled in 2020 on the centenary of the 19th Amendment, which granted women the right to vote.
Preliminary designs for the note obtained by the New York Times revealed that – before Mr. Trump took office – concept work on a Tubman bill on the front and a statue of Jackson on the back was already in progress.
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