{"id":602,"date":"2026-07-20T19:41:19","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T19:41:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/prorelocationteam.com\/?p=602"},"modified":"2026-07-20T19:41:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T19:41:19","slug":"featuring-trump-on-us-coins-and-bills-would-put-america-in-rare-company","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/prorelocationteam.com\/?p=602","title":{"rendered":"Featuring Trump on US coins and bills would put America in rare\u00a0company"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

A slang term for cash money is \u201cdead presidents.\u201d But now the very much alive President Donald Trump could appear on U.S. coins and banknotes, too.<\/p>\n

Read more Declassified intelligence is not the same as\u00a0proof<\/a><\/p>\n

Ever since Trump returned to power in 2025, his administration has put the president\u2019s face and name on all sorts of things, from federal buildings to national park passes. Putting him on the almighty dollar would be the crowning achievement of these efforts. After all, the value of physical U.S. currency in circulation today stands at over US$2.46 trillion, an all-time high. <\/p>\n

If a sitting president\u2019s portraits start appearing on U.S. currency, what would this change say about American political culture? <\/p>\n

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said he doesn\u2019t \u201cthink that there\u2019s anything untoward\u201d about the idea, while Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley has said, \u201cPresident Trump\u2019s self-celebrating maneuvers are authoritarian actions worthy of dictators like North Korea\u2019s Kim Jong Un.\u201d <\/p>\n

As a professor of international relations who has studied the global evolution of currency iconography for over 20 years, I take a worldwide perspective on this debate. The data that I have amassed shows that such a choice by the U.S. would be out of step with nearly every other currency in the world.<\/p>\n

All about the Benjamins \u2013 or the Donalds?<\/h2>\n

The Trump administration has been incredibly active on the currency front. <\/p>\n

In January 2026, Trump\u2019s handpicked commissioners of the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, a federal agency that advises on design and aesthetics, recommended designs for a circulating $1 coin featuring Trump\u2019s head. The commission later also recommended a different portrayal of Trump for a 24-karat gold commemorative coin that it suggested making \u201cas large as possible.\u201d These coins were supposed to be ready for July 4, but production delays at the U.S. Mint have pushed the release date back. <\/p>\n

The administration is also preparing Trump-branded banknotes. In March 2026, the U.S. Department of the Treasury announced a historic first: From now on, the president\u2019s signature will be on newly printed paper dollars.<\/p>\n

In April, the Treasury Department abruptly reassigned the director of its Bureau of Engraving and Printing, Patricia Solimene, after she had refused to advance a $250 bill with Trump\u2019s face on it, according to The Washington Post. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe buck stopped here,\u201d Solimene wrote in a goodbye email to colleagues. But after her reassignment, the buck started again. In May, Bessent publicly displayed a $250 bill design featuring Trump \u2013 even while acknowledging that the new bills cannot be printed until Congress changes the 160-year-old law against depicting living persons on U.S. paper currency. <\/p>\n

The Donald J. Trump $250 Bill Act, a measure to amend the law, is awaiting further congressional action in the House Committee on Financial Services. Treasury claims it already has the legal authority to mint its Trump coins. <\/p>\n

Examining the world\u2019s coins<\/h2>\n

Putting the sitting president\u2019s face on coins would be a dramatic departure from U.S. tradition. The only previous such instance in the country\u2019s history was a 1926 commemorative half-dollar showing then-President Calvin Coolidge alongside George Washington. <\/p>\n

But what about other countries in the contemporary world? How normal is it for their sitting leaders to appear on their coins?<\/p>\n

Using the most recent edition of Coin & Mint News\u2019 Directory of Circulating Coins \u2013 a standard reference for coin professionals working at national mints and central banks \u2013 I counted the images of sitting state leaders on the circulating coins of the world as of 2024. (Note: This data has not yet gone through rigorous peer review.)<\/p>\n

Read more How America\u2019s newspapers lost their\u00a0voice<\/a><\/p>\n

Analyzing nearly 1,000 coins from 165 independent countries, I counted only 22 countries \u2013 about 13% of the total \u2013 whose circulating coins feature their sitting head of state. This number includes coins depicting heads of state who were in office when the coin was originally issued, whether or not they were still there in 2024. <\/p>\n

Almost all the sitting heads of state who appear on the circulating coins that I analyzed are hereditary monarchs.<\/p>\n

If a country is a hereditary monarchy \u2013 whether its political system is democratic, like the United Kingdom, or authoritarian, like Brunei \u2013 there is a high chance that its reigning king or queen is on its circulating coins. This is the case for about 62% of the monarchies in my database, or 21 out of 34. <\/p>\n

On the other hand, if a country is not a hereditary monarchy, its sitting head of state is almost certainly not on its circulating coins. This is the case for 99% of the nonmonarchy countries in my database, or 130 out of 131. <\/p>\n

The lone exception is Samoa, a parliamentary democracy whose circulating coins all feature the country\u2019s head of state as of 2011, the coins\u2019 original year of issuance. However, even Samoa is hardly an exception, as its political culture has many of the trappings of a monarchy: Its head of state is called \u201cHis Highness,\u201d and he is traditionally chosen from among the country\u2019s four paramount chieftains.<\/p>\n

Examining the world\u2019s banknotes<\/h2>\n

A similar story emerges from my data on banknotes. <\/p>\n

Using Bank Note Museum \u2013 a free online catalog crowdsourced from a network of banknote collectors \u2013 and supplementing that data with information from Greysheet publications\u2019 paywalled catalog The Banknote Book, I created a database of all the circulating banknotes in the world that were newly designed and issued between 2019 and 2024. <\/p>\n

According to my data, 84 independent countries issued 340 new regular circulating banknotes during the chosen time frame. Yet only 13 of those countries \u2013 about 15% \u2013 issued new banknotes depicting their sitting head of state. All but one of the 13 countries that did so are hereditary monarchies. <\/p>\n

The lone exception to the rule is Botswana, a democratic republic that has traditionally featured the sitting president\u2019s portrait on its 10 pula banknote denomination. However, Duma Boko, Botswana\u2019s president since late 2024, is still waiting for his 10 pula note. <\/p>\n

US currency: Fit for a king?<\/h2>\n

Today, almost every country that isn\u2019t a hereditary monarchy is declining to issue currency that features its sitting head of state. Since the U.S. isn\u2019t a hereditary monarchy, putting Trump\u2019s face on U.S. currency while he is still in office would be highly abnormal.<\/p>\n

The nationwide \u201cNo Kings\u201d protest movement has mobilized millions of Americans to march the streets in opposition to what they perceive as Trump\u2019s monarchical ambitions. The global patterns of currency iconography suggest that they might have a point.<\/p>\n

University of Southern California undergraduate student Anyi Tan contributed to this research.<\/em><\/p>\n

Read more South Carolina is allowing teachers to give zeros again, but the problem with grading goes\u00a0deeper<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A professor of international relations counted the sitting leaders on over 1,000 of the world\u2019s banknotes and coins; almost every one of them is a king or a queen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[315],"tags":[374,1837,1836,327,380,1835,1834,1839,1840,28,1838,486],"class_list":["post-602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-america-250","tag-banknotes","tag-currency","tag-donald-trump","tag-international-relations","tag-monarchy","tag-money","tag-no-kings","tag-no-kings-rallies","tag-trump-administration","tag-us-treasury","tag-us-treasury-department"],"yoast_head":"\nFeaturing Trump on US coins and bills would put America in rare\u00a0company - Pro Relocation Team<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/prorelocationteam.com\/?p=602\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Featuring Trump on US coins and bills would put America in rare\u00a0company - 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