Trump, Old Hickory, and 2020

The U.S. 20-dollar bill has Andrew Jackson on the front and the White House on the back. It is the only banknote to depict the White House. It is the only denomination of U.S. currency whose number corresponds to an election year.

I am not the first to have connected the 20-dollar bill with the year '20. Back in 2015 -- the centennial of the Battle of New Orleans -- a movement called "Women on 20s" was launched, with the stated goal of getting Old Hickory off the 20-dollar bill by 2020 and replacing him with a woman. It was later decided (by a vote, naturally) that this woman would be Harriet Tubman. The reason for choosing the 20-dollar bill, and the year 2020, was that 1920 was the year women began to participate in mass voting in the U.S. (A secondary reason, of course, was that the Democratic Party hates hates hates the man who founded it.)

During his 2016 campaign, Donald Trump announced that he would oppose this plan to replace Jackson with Tubman, and made it clear that he was pro-Jackson rather than anti-Tubman. CNN quoted him thus:

"Well, Andrew Jackson had a great history, and I think it's very rough when you take somebody off the bill," Trump said during a town hall on the "Today" show on NBC Thursday morning. "I think Harriet Tubman is fantastic, but I would love to leave Andrew Jackson or see if we can maybe come up with another denomination."

When Trump moved into the White House in 2017, he immediately had a large portrait of Andrew Jackson put up in the Oval Office. He clearly sees himself as a second Old Hickory.

The 2020 election made it clear that Trump's decision to keep Jackson was the right one. To allow him to be replaced by a woman-of-color named Harriet on the 20 would have symbolically foreshadowed Trump's allowing himself to be replaced by a woman-of-color named Harris in '20. But Jackson stayed, and so will Trump, and regular readers will know I have reason to suspect his final victory will take place on or around the anniversary of the Battle of New Orleans.

By the way, Women on 20s is now saying the Jackson's continued presence on U.S. currency is what killed George Floyd. From their website:

Women On 20s and associates are calling on the U.S. Treasury to take a knee and make our $20s counterfeit proof and upgrade it with a portrait of Harriet Tubman. The Treasury’s failure to update the $20 cannot be separated from the tragic events which led to the murder of George Floyd on May 25th, 2020. . . . As we’ve been saying for years, symbols do matter.

You may recall that the reason Mr. Floyd was in police custody when he died had to do with his alleged attempt to pass a counterfeit 20-dollar bill. If only that particular denomination had been "upgraded" with the counterfeit-proof likeness of Harriet Tubman, he would probably still be alive today!

Well, they're right about one thing anyway: Symbols do matter. Keep playing this song.