Probe sought over Tubman-bill delay

WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., asked the U.S. Treasury Department’s inspector general Wednesday to open an investigation into delayed design concepts of a new $20 note featuring the image of Harriet Tubman that were set to be unveiled next year.

President Donald Trump’s administration has faced backlash after Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said the design concepts for a $20 bill featuring Tubman would not be released next year and that the new note might not even include her when it does come into circulation, most likely in 2030.

The New York Times revealed last week that design work on a $20 featuring Tubman’s portrait had started before Trump took office and extended into last year.

In a letter to the inspector general, Schumer noted that the Empire State Building was constructed in a little more than a year and expressed doubt that it should take the Treasury Department more than a decade to roll out a new $20 bill.

Rich Delmar, Treasury’s acting inspector general, said in an email that he is reviewing the request.

In 2016, Jacob Lew, President Barack Obama’s treasury secretary, announced after soliciting public feedback that Tubman would replace Andrew Jackson on the front of the $20 bill and that a smaller image of Jackson, a former slave holder, would be moved to the back of the bill. Under a timeline set forth by Lew, design concepts of the new bill were scheduled to be released in 2020, on the 100th anniversary of women gaining the right to vote.