Donald Trump’s apparent dream—or at least, that of his sycophants—of appearing on the currency has taken a major step forward.
A new U.S. commemorative coin design combining two of Trump’s favorite things (gold and looking “tough”) has been approved by one of the two committees that allow for currency designs.
The Commission on Fine Arts, composed solely of Trump appointees, voted on Thursday to approve the proposal of a $1 commemorative 24-karat gold coin showing the 79-year-old president resting on his desk with clenched fists. It is modeled after a portrait taken by his White House photographer, Daniel Torok, last year.
A U.S. Mint official said Trump himself personally approved the design for the coin, the Washington Post reported. Gold coins like this from the Mint often sell for thousands of dollars.
Chamberlain Harris, the White House’s deputy director of Oval Office operations, said that the image depicts Trump looking “very strong and very tough,” and that the coin’s minting is “fitting” ahead of the country’s 250th anniversary in July.
“I think the larger the better, and the largest of that circulation, I think, would be his preference,” Harris told the Post.
James McCrery II, whom Trump fired as his ballroom architect after he said the design was too big, told Treasury officials during the vote to make the coin “as large as possible, all the way to three inches in diameter.”
There is one final obstacle to Trump’s plan. Before new coins are minted, they must be approved by another panel in addition to the Commission of Fine Arts. The Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee, a bipartisan group comprised of coin-collecting experts, refused to approve the measure last month.
Michael Moran, a Republican member of the CCAC, said the decision to mint Trump on a coin was “wrong.”
“It goes against American culture and the traditions that drive what we put on our coinage,” he said. “I didn’t sign up for this.”
Basketball star Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, himself a numismatist who once served on the committee, expressed his disdain for the potential minting.
“I’m not enthusiastic about memorializing Mr. Trump on a coin because he has done so much damage to our country,” Abdul-Jabbar said. “It takes a huge consensus to get agreement on something like this, and I’m not inclined to be supportive of the president’s request.”
The Daily Beast reached out to the White House for comment.
The only president to be depicted on a U.S. coin during their lifetime was Calvin Coolidge, who was featured on a coin commemorating the country’s sesquicentennial 100 years ago. Most of his coins were later melted.
Trump’s last attempt to get himself on a $1 coin last year failed after the CCAC rejected the proposal. The arts commission approved that design in January, but the Treasury hasn’t confirmed whether the coin will enter circulation.
The coinage is the Trump administration’s latest attempt to plaster the president’s name across American institutions.
Trump’s family company, the Trump Organization, filed a series of trademarks surrounding the topic of “Trump 250″ in anticipation of the nation’s upcoming semiquincentennial.
