In 1864, amid the Civil War, an ambitious government official made a very Trumpian move.
Spencer Clark, the first Superintendent of the National Currency Bureau, had been instructed to put the face of Lewis Clark, the famous explorer, on the front of the new 5-cent note, which would be worth about $1 today.
However, so the story goes, he had not been specifically told which ‘Clark’ and instead cheekily decided to put his own visage on it, sporting an impressive beard. The notes were duly produced in huge numbers.
Congress was outraged and two years later passed a new law banning any living person from being on the nation’s paper money, bonds or securities.
It was known as the Thayer Amendment and for 160 years that has remained the case, with only deceased people, such as Abraham Lincoln and Alexander Hamilton, being allowed.
Until now. Like Clark, Donald J Trump appears to quite fancy the look of himself on a greenback – in his case a much bigger one, even accounting for inflation, worth $250.
It is just one element of a planned Trumpification of the dollar that has led to allegations from Democrats of presidential egoism and of sycophancy by Republican officials and representatives.
As the comedian Bill Maher put it: ‘They’re putting out a $250 bill with Trump’s face on it… Republicans in Congress are thrilled about it; they cannot wait to carry it in their wallet. What a switcheroo having Trump’s face next to THEIR a**.’
A design for the proposed $250 bill featuring the picture and signature of President Donald Trump
In addition to the $250 bill, Trump has also moved to have his signature placed on other banknotes instead of that of the Treasurer of the United States. There is also a commemorative coin planned with his image on it to mark the 250th anniversary of America. He is also doing away with the puny and much-maligned penny.
One of the arguments advanced for putting the image of Trump or indeed whoever happens to be president on currency is that other countries do it.
In the UK, King Charles III is on all four Bank of England note denominations. The late Queen Elizabeth II, during her lifetime, was on currency in numerous countries where she was head of state.
However, for many Americans, that is also the biggest reason Trump should not be.
Nations where the head of state is on the notes, including the UK, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and North Korea, generally have a monarch or a president who was not elected.
‘There was a time when the only time you saw the King or the Emperor was on the coin. That was the moment in which you came into contact with the state,’ Brendan Greeley, author of The Almighty Dollar: 500 Years Of The World’s Most Powerful Money, told the Daily Mail.
‘So, I think this is a very ancient and powerful message that it sends. When you look back at when we put new kings or emperors on coins, it heralded a change of regime, that something is very different. So, regardless of how it started with the scoundrel Spencer Clark, we entered a regime where we don’t put living presidents on coins or bills.’
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A Semiquincentennial commemorative gold coin design featuring President Donald Trump
As the first president, George Washington was averse to the monarchical overtones of himself being on coinage and instead the 1792 Coinage Act specified it should be an image representing ‘liberty.’
‘In the early republic the federal government didn’t really manufacture a lot of money, almost all of our money was private bank notes, and people put whatever they wanted on their own bank notes, local waterfalls, or local political figures, or horses, or ships,’ said Greeley.
‘It was only during the Civil War, really, when the federal government started printing one kind of dollar for all Americans, and originally it was supposed to be educational, what we now call patriotic education, pictures of Pocahontas getting baptized and the surrender of General Burgoyne at the Battle of Saratoga.’
There was one partial exception. In the 1920s President Calvin Coolidge put himself on a half dollar coin minted to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. The Thayer Amendment did not cover coins. However, there was a forceful backlash, and some of the coins were melted down.
The design for a 24-karat gold commemorative 250th anniversary coin featuring Trump was finalized by the US Commission of Fine Arts in March.
Its front features an image of the President in a suit and tie with a stern look on his face, his fists resting on a desk.
Lettering on it includes ‘LIBERTY’ and ‘IN GOD WE TRUST’ and the dates 1776-2026.
Trump’s coin will mean ‘we are now in a regime where the president is allowed to put his face on a coin,’ said Greeley. ‘That says something different about America. I think that’s a more profound change than just some decorative choices on our currency.’
$100 notes lay in stacks at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington. New ones with President Trump’s signature are reportedly being made
The first rumblings of the Trump $250 note came last year when Brandon Beach, the Trump-appointed Treasurer of the United States, sent a design for it to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing (BEP), which produces the country’s notes. The US Mint produces coins.
The note was designed by Iain Alexander, a British artist based in the Channel Islands.
Alexander, whom the Daily Mail tried unsuccessfully to reach, has been pictured at Mar-a-Lago with the President, who apparently calls him his ‘favorite British artist.’
He has previously painted a three-dimensional portrait of Queen Elizabeth II and others of Elon Musk’s mother and Tyson Fury’s family. Previously, he was a top-level swimmer, DJ and had his own club in Dubai.
A social media picture shows him with President Trump and a portrait in 2024 and is captioned: ‘Congratulations, Mr President. It has been a pleasure to work for you over the last two weeks.’
According to the artist, the President added his own flourishes for the $250 note, including the US flag colors and a logo for the 250th anniversary.
The back of the note is to feature Betsy Ross, the Revolutionary War era upholsterer linked to the design of the US flag.
Betsy Ross, the Revolutionary War seamstress (R) would feature on the back of the $250 note
However, the plan for the new note did not go down well at the BEP.
Its Director Patty Solimene was moved to another role within the Treasury six weeks ago.
In a parting email, which became public, the military veteran said she had a ‘heavy heart,’ adding that she ”never sacrificed the values or character of myself or the organization,’ and that ‘the buck stopped here.’ That was a reference to the bureau’s motto – ‘The buck starts here.’
Other bureau staff reportedly also pushed back, saying it could take at least six years to produce the $250 Trump note due to complex procedures which also involve the Federal Reserve and banks.
The move to change the Thayer Amendment began well over a year ago. Joe Wilson, a Republican congressman from South Carolina, submitted the proposed Donald J Trump $250 Bill Act. It has not yet moved forward in the House.
Democrats say it is a non-starter and have pounced on it as an example of the White House being out of touch.
‘If this White House put even half as much energy into working to lower costs as it does into stoking the president’s ego, American families wouldn’t need that new $250 bill just to fill up their gas tanks.’ said Mark Warner, Democratic senator for Virginia.
‘The upcoming July 4th anniversary is not about a wannabe King,’ said Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who showed off the design publicly, has defended it as a fair way to mark America’s semiquincentennial.
‘I don’t think that there’s anything untoward about having the President of the United States, the person who was President of the United States, on the 250th anniversary bill,’ he said.
President Trump is facing a backlash from Democrats over the idea of putting his signature on greenbacks
Meanwhile, Beach described replacing his signature on notes with that of President Trump as the right thing to do.
‘The President’s mark on history as the architect of America’s Golden Age economic revival is undeniable,’ he said. ‘Printing his signature on the American currency is not only appropriate, but also well deserved.’
$100 bills with Trump’s signature, the first to carry that of an incumbent president, are reportedly being printed at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington.
Shontel Brown, a Democratic congresswoman, called the move ‘gross and un-American.’
It all seems part of a wider effort to secure President Trump’s enduring legacy, which also includes attempts to rename the Kennedy Center and US Institute of Peace after him, along with a Trump class of battleships and a move to have his face on passports.
However, as other nations have already found, putting politically divisive rather than unifying figures on currency can spark vitriolic debates. The European Union even avoided putting real buildings on Euro notes to avoid rows between member states. The UK has recently been involved in a row over removing Winston Churchill from a note and replacing him with wildlife.
Meanwhile, President Trump’s decision to abolish the penny is less about legacy and more rooted in economics.
The cost of producing the zinc and copper coins has nearly tripled over the last decade and it now takes 3.69 cents to make every 1 cent piece, according to the Treasury. $1 notes are cheaper to print.
The US Mint lost $85.3 million making pennies, which feature an image of Abraham Lincoln, in 2024.
‘This is wasteful,’ President Trump wrote on Truth Social in February. ‘Let’s rip the waste out of our great nation’s budget, even if it’s a penny at a time.’
President Trump is abolishing the one cent coin
As the penny fades into obscurity, the proposed $250 notes would secure President Trump’s legacy forever in that they would always be redeemable as legal tender. People could be passing ‘Trumps’ for decades to come.
However, there are doubts they would ever be commonly used in everyday transactions, especially as the world moves away from paper money.
‘I’m not sure how valuable this $250 bill would be in actual exchange. You’re not going to be able to give it to somebody at a bodega for a pack of gum, that’s just not how money works anymore,’ said Greeley.
‘We’re moving away from cash. I’m not sure what happens to this very old idea of putting your own face on money when we move away from cash.’
However, should paper money disappear, the Trump name may well survive on future transactions – just in case, there is also a $TRUMP cryptocurrency coin, currently worth around $2.
