By Ed Epstein
Washington, D.C.
Monday, February 10, 2025
The U.S. Mint says it loses about $85 million a year turning out 3.2 billion pennies featuring Abraham Lincoln on the front side, a practice President Donald Trump says has to stop. He has ordered the U.S. Treasury to stop minting the coins, although it's unclear if he has the legal authority to do so.
The lowly penny has been under siege for many years. Critics say it would be cheaper to round transactions to the nearest five cents. Rep. Jim Kolbe, an Arizona Republican, twice introduced legislation to do away with the penny, but Congress failed to act. His efforts were opposed by producers of the zinc blanks used to make pennies.
Two Republican senators, John McCain (of Arizona) and Mike Enzi (of Wyoming), co-sponsored the Currency Optimization, Innovation, and National Savings (C.O.I.N.S.) Act in 2017. It called for stopping penny production for 10 years and for a study to determine if penny output could be permanently stopped after those 10 years. It also went nowhere.
“For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents. This is so wasteful!” Trump wrote Sunday night. “I have instructed my Secretary of the US Treasury to stop producing new pennies.”
It costs the government more than three cents to turn out each one-cent coin.
Whether Trump has the authority to kill the penny is unclear. Congress specifies the denomination, size, and metal content of U.S. coins. What is known is that millions of Americans have piggy banks full of pennies stashed away. Those coins will remain legal tender.
The president didn't mention the nickel, on which the Treasury also loses money on production, including the cost of the copper and nickel used to make them.
Lincoln has been on the penny since 1909, the centennial of his birth. The original penny, dating from 1792, featured a woman with flowing hair, symbolizing liberty. That image was replaced by the Indian head penny before Lincoln was honored. His likeness on the penny was designed by Victor David Brenner, a Lithuania-born sculptor and engraver.
The current reverse of the penny features the symbol of the Union, which Lincoln, of course, preserved. Before that, the Lincoln Memorial was on the reverse.
Even if the Mint stops cranking out pennies, Lincoln will still be honored on U.S. currency. He is on the front of the $5 bill. The back features the Lincoln Memorial. Lincoln's likeness on the bill is based on a February 9, 1864, photo taken by Matthew Brady.
Image from the U.S. Treasury