This spring, however, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said that the redesign process would be pushed back until 2026, with the new bill not coming out until 2028. Now, as Vanessa Romo reports for NPR, the Treasury Department is conducting an internal investigation into the circ*mstances surrounding the delay.
The move to boost Tubman’s image onto the $20 bill—while bumping Jackson from the currency—was supposed to be a significant moment for the nation. Tubman was slated to be the first woman to appear on paper currency since the late 19th century, when Martha Washington’s portrait briefly adorned the $1 silver certificate. What’s more, Jackson, in addition to being the country’s seventh president, was a slaveholder. Tubman, an escaped slave, helped lead slaves to freedom on the Underground Railroad.
In May, Mnuchin told the House Financial Services Committee that the redesign was being delayed because making security upgrades to the $10 and $50 bills were a priority.
“The primary reason we’ve looked at redesigning the currency is for counterfeiting issues,” he explained. “Based upon this, the $20 bill will now not come out until 2028. The $10 and the $50 will come out with new features beforehand.”
In a letter to the Treasury Department dated June 19, Senator Chuck Schumer of New York requested that the office investigate the circ*mstances surrounding the delay. “We do not know the real reason for these decisions,” Schumer wrote, but noted that during his 2016 campaign, President Trump, who is an admirer of Jackson, called the redesign efforts “pure political correctness.”
Rich Delmar, acting inspector general of the Treasury Department who works as an “internal watchdog,” responded later that week, informing Schumer that an investigation into the fate of the $20 bill would be incorporated into a larger, pre-planned audit of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing’s implementation of currency security features. “As part of this work,” Delmar wrote, “we will interview the stakeholders involved in the new note design process.”
The investigation will “specifically include review of the process with respect to the $20 bill,” Delmar added. “If, in the course of our audit work, we discover indications of employee misconduct or other matters that warrant a referral to our Office of Investigations, we will do so expeditiously.” The inquiry, Delmar said, will take around 10 months.
Some have questioned whether the decision to push back the redesign was motivated by politics, rather than security concerns. Earlier this month, Alan Rappeport of the New York Times reported that work on the new bill was “well underway” by the time Mnuchin made his announcement, and that “a metal engraving plate and a digital image of a Tubman $20 bill” were being reviewed by Secret Service officials and engravers as recently as May 2018.
Mnuchin, however, maintained that he had not deliberately slowed down the process. His spokesperson, Monica Crowley, noted that a new $20 bill was still on track to be released into circulation by 2030—the Obama administration had also stipulated that the bill would be circulated several years after its design was first revealed—but she did not say that the new design would feature Tubman, according to Rappeport.
In a statement, Schumer said he was “pleased” the inspector general had decided to look into the matter.
“There are no women, there are no people of color on our paper currency today, even though they make up a significant majority of our population,” he added, “and the previous administration’s plan to put New Yorker Harriet Tubman on the $20 note was a long overdue way to recognize that disparity, and rectify it.”
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Brigit Katz is a freelance writer based in Toronto. Her work has appeared in a number of publications, including NYmag.com, Flavorwire and Tina Brown Media's Women in the World.
The reason? The deadline for printing a new version of the $20 bill is 2030. It was set by an anti-counterfeiting committee in 2013, two years before Tubman won a campaign to replace President Andrew Jackson on the bill.
WASHINGTON (AP) — With a change of administrations, it looks like Harriet Tubman is once again headed to the front of the $20 bill. Biden press secretary Jen Psaki said Monday that the Treasury Department is taking steps to resume efforts to put the 19th century abolitionist leader on the $20 bill.
(Washington, DC) – As Women's History Month gets underway, this week, U.S. Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) renewed her nearly decade-long push to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill by introducing the Harriet Tubman Tribute Act of 2023.
The head of the Cherokee Nation believes Andrew Jackson's portrait should be stripped from the $20 bill and replaced by the late tribal leader Wilma Mankiller — justice, he says, for the former president's transgressions against Native Americans.
In May 2019, Mnuchin stated that no new imagery for the new 2028 $20 bill would be unveiled until 2026. He also reaffirmed that the new $20 bill would not be moved up ahead of the new $10 or $50 bills due to counterfeiting security concerns regarding the $10 and $50.
President Grover Cleveland is featured on the newer (1928-1934) $1000 notes. He was the United States of America's 22nd president. The historical figures showcased on older currency are President Andrew Jackson on Civil War-era $1,000 bills and Founding Father Alexander Hamilton on the 1918 Federal Reserve note.
Tubman's connections to Boston run deep and long. She drew some of her greatest support from friends and allies here. With their help, Tubman raised funds to sustain her work in the fight against slavery as well as care for those that depended upon her.
It only takes a few seconds to check the security features of the $20 note. To know it's real, just feel the paper, tilt the note, and check with light. Hold the note to light to see a faint image of Andrew Jackson to the right of the portrait. The watermark is visible from both sides of the note.
The Fed and Treasury discontinued the $500 bill in 1969 for lack of use. It was last printed in 1945, but the Treasury says Americans continue to hold the notes. McKinley is noteworthy because he is among the few presidents who were assassinated.
In 1890, under a law passed by Congress, Tubman became eligible for a widow's pension of $8 a month based on her husband's service. Still, she and supporters such as William Henry Seward, President Lincoln's secretary of State, pressed for the government to provide her with her own retirement benefit.
The $5 note features a portrait of President Abraham Lincoln on the front of the note. The vignette on the back of the note changed in 1929 to feature the Lincoln Memorial.
The face on your $100 bill is none other than Benjamin Franklin, a Founding Father of the United States. Celebrated for his contributions to science, politics, and philosophy, Franklin's legacy continues to be revered centuries later.
Her goal to achieve freedom was too large for her to give up though. So in 1849 she left her husband and escaped to Philadelphia in 1849. 1849 Escape. Harriet was given a piece of paper by a white abolitionist neighbor with two names, and told how to find the first house on her path to freedom.
Myth: Harriet Tubman had a $40,000 “dead or alive” bounty on her head. Fact: The only reward for Tubman's capture is in the October 3, 1849 advertisem*nt for the return of “Minty” and her brothers “Ben” and “Harry,” in which their mistress, Eliza Brodess, offered $100 for each of them if caught outside of Maryland.
At 13 years old, Tubman suffered a traumatic injury that almost killed her when a two-pound weight missed its intended target and hit Tubman in the head instead. Though her mother was able to nurse her back to health, Tubman suffered from epilepsy for the rest of her life.
All these bills except one featured presidents: William McKinley on the $500, Grover Cleveland on the $1,000, and James Madison on the $5,000. Salmon Chase, a nonpresident, was featured on the $10,000 bill; he was secretary of the Treasury under President Lincoln and chief justice of the Supreme Court.
Introduction: My name is Pres. Carey Rath, I am a faithful, funny, vast, joyous, lively, brave, glamorous person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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:focal(536x234:537x235)/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer/8c/f7/8cf777e6-e655-4072-9ee0-85ed8b262f9a/tubmancrop.jpg "An Internal Watchdog Will Investigate the Delay of the Harriet Tubman $20 Bill (1)")
