In what is the monetary equivalent of tearing down statues, the British have decided they must replace iconic images on their currency. Out of an apparent fear of offending the stampede of human beings who have chosen to abandon their own homelands to live in Great Britain, the historic images on British currency of people instrumental in making that nation what it is, have been forced to yield to images of animals. Foxes, badgers, and hedgehogs are in the ascendency.
Our problem in the United States is somewhat different. It appears that the iconography of our currency will be made to climax in images of Donald Trump.
The president’s incursion into the currency world is not a sidelight of his self-canonization. It is an obsession. He marked the country’s 250th Anniversary by designating his signature to appear on U.S. currency, a first ever for a sitting president.
Lawmakers will decide on another fixation: a new $250 U.S. banknote bearing Trump’s image. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent specifically linked the currency to the upcoming festivities for the country’s 250th Anniversary celebration. U.S. law bars any living person from appearing on its currency, but legislation was introduced last year to create an exception to allow Trump to be featured.
In a period of rising inflation, the president reveals himself either tone deaf or simply indifferent to the affordability crisis Americans face. It is more than likely that his shameless self-flattery with a high denomination currency will instead be forever linked to the wasting away of the dollar’s purchasing power and a powerful reminder of his substantial part in it since the national debt has grown by a breathtaking 27% during his time in office.
Further giving vanity a bad name, a Donald Trump Commemorative gold coin has received final design approval from the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts (comprised entirely of Trump appointees) clearing the way for the U.S. Mint to begin production planning.
Meanwhile, production has begun on a separate $1 Trump commemorative coin. It features a gold-wash appearance and is scheduled for release sometime this fall. It makes Trump the first living president in history to have his image on U.S. currency.
Without even getting into the compulsion to rename airports or performing arts centers, there are still other things that we might call currency adjacent. Among them is the $TRUMP coin which should live in infamy for its sheer brazenness.
From Libertarian Institute contributor Thomas Karat’s Substack article “Trump’s Corruption Is the Product“:
“Of the roughly 1.48 million wallets that bought the coin after its launch, the blockchain analytics firm Nansen found that 988,905 — nearly two out of every three — were underwater by the end of June 2026. Their combined losses came to $3.81 billion…Against those losses, set the President’s take. His June 2026 financial disclosure — a 927-page filing with the Office of Government Ethics — reported $636 million in royalties from the $TRUMP coin alone, part of roughly $1.2 billion in crypto income for the year. Nearly a million of his supporters lost close to four billion dollars so that he could book six hundred million.”
Yet for reasons of health, impeachment, resignation, term expiration, or other means fair or foul, Trump will be gone in a few years. In the meantime it is instructive to consider what the changing faces of our currency reveal about our changing national character, and therefore our national trajectory.
America’s earliest coins portrayed Liberty. Not rulers and politicians, just Liberty, a symbolic representation of the country’s highest ideal. In the beginning, Americans had an affair of the heart with Liberty. She was their muse and they were aflame in their love for her. They talked about her everywhere, in their churches and taverns and town squares. Although the Mint is issuing a one-year circulating dime redesign for the Semiquincentennial that features an image of Liberty (how could they not?), she hasn’t appeared as the main portrait on our regular issue circulation coinage for more than three generations, not since the beautiful “Walking Liberty” half-dollar ended in 1947. It represented Liberty striding gracefully into the rising sun of the future, arm extended in peace and carrying a bounty of riches. It was a fitting representation, well chosen because abundance accompanies Liberty wherever she goes. Our devotion to her would be no less if it were not true, but it is one of her secrets: Liberty creates prosperity.
Today’s coinage, looking more like subway tokens each year, celebrates the state or icons of the state. Just as words replace deeds and paper substitutes for gold, politicians have displaced ideals. The American state, which was created to serve Liberty, is now commemorated instead.
We chart our course, even unconsciously, with the aid of the symbols and icons that are held before us. While our leaders including Trump (if not especially Trump), often prove to have feet of clay, why not use what we have learned from this experience to elevate the iconography of our currency, raise out sights, and steer the American ship with ideals like Liberty that endure through the ages?
