In yet another blow to the reeling “woke” movement, the plan to put famed abolitionist Harriet Tubman’s face on the $20 bill has been scrapped by the Treasury Department.
The idea to feature the iconic Underground Railroad anti-slavery activist on the frequently circulated currency was initially hatched during the Obama administration, was shelved by President Donald J. Trump during his first term, and then revived during disgraced former President Joe Biden’s regime, which served as a four-year laboratory for divisive and malicious DEI initiatives.
In an interview with Spectrum News, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was asked a question about the status of the long-awaited Tubman twenty and responded “not at present,” which means that former President Andrew Jackson will continue to be featured on the bill for the foreseeable future, or at least until the Democrats are back in control of the White House. He didn’t elaborate.
🚨Just in: The Treasury Department has scrapped plans for Harriet Tubman to be placed on the $20 Bill
This means President Andrew Jackson will remain on the $20 Bill for years to come pic.twitter.com/WQYw5sP18I
— The Calvin Coolidge Project (@TheCalvinCooli1) July 8, 2026
Back in 2016, then-Treasury Secretary Jack Lew announced the proposal to alter the $20 bill in honor of Tubman, which would have made her the first black woman to be featured on the currency, replacing Jackson, the nation’s seventh president, who has been featured on the note since 1928. Lew said that the decision was reached after thousands of responses expressing support for the overhaul.
According to lore, the idea may have been inspired by an 11-year-old girl from Massachusetts who wrote a letter to former President Barack Obama asking why there weren’t any women’s faces on the currency.
“She came home from school one day, and she said, ‘Mom, I need to write to the president,’ so I gave her a piece of paper, and that became the really famous letter,” the child’s mother told ABC News in 2016. “She really is just a regular, average, little girl who noticed something that was unfair and decided to do something about it.”
After being shelved following Trump’s election the first time, the zombie Tubman bill was resurrected by the next administration.
“The Treasury Department is taking steps to resume efforts to put Harriet Tubman on the front of the new $20 notes,” then-White House Press Secretary and current MS NOW host told reporters in 2021, according to The Hill.
At the time, Psaki said the administration was “exploring ways to speed up the process” and that the national currency should “reflect the history and diversity of our country, and Harriet Tubman’s image gracing the new $20 note would certainly reflect that.”
The latest postponement of the Tubman twenty comes after some have advocated for the current president to be featured on a new $250 bill to mark the nation’s 250th anniversary.
When asked about why Trump and not Tubman, Bessent responded.
“The 250 requires an act of Congress, because you can’t have a living person (on U.S. currency), and it was to commit [sic] – for the 250th anniversary,” the Treasury secretary told Spectrum News.
“For us to change an existing bill, whether it’s $1 through $100, takes many years in advance,” Bessent said.
“Commemorating Harriet Tubman would have been the perfect way to honor the women who helped build this country and bravely stood up for freedom and equality throughout our nation’s remarkable 250-year history,” a “disappointed” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) said in a statement, according to Spectrum News.
“Though Secretary Bessent may be more interested in illegally plastering Donald Trump’s image on a $250 bill, putting a woman on a U.S. bill remains long overdue, and I will keep focusing on finding a path to honor Harriet Tubman’s patriotism and sacrifice,” whined the Democrat lawmaker who has been trying to get Tubman’s face plastered onto the currency for more than a decade.
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