President Trump ordered the Treasury to eliminate the “wasteful” cent during a Super Bowl social media outburst in New Orleans.
“The US has minted pennies that cost more than 2 cents for too long. So wasteful! He wrote on Truth Social around 8:30 p.m. Sunday that he had ordered the Treasury Secretary to cease making pennies.
Trump suspended the demand due to the one-cent coin's escalating costs, a longtime argument highlighted by Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency on X last month. Since plundering government agencies, Musk's DOGE geniuses have slashed over $1 billion in federal spending.
Trump wrote in the Truth post, “Let's rip the waste out of our great nation's budget, even if it's a penny at a time”.
Pennies were first issued in 1793 and currently circulate over 250 billion in the U.S. Unfortunately, in 2024, the U.S. Mint stated that each one-cent penny cost 3.69 cents to produce, over three and a half times its face value.
The Treasury Department also said that the penny's unit cost rose 20.2 percent, the nickel 19.4 percent, the dime 8.7 percent, and the quarter-dollar 26.2 percent since last year.
The Treasury Department also said that the penny's unit cost rose 20.2 percent, the nickel 19.4 percent, the dime 8.7 percent, and the quarter-dollar 26.2 percent since last year.
As Congress controls coin size and metal content, it is unclear if Trump will be able to implement his extensive reforms.