Harriet Tubman Still Isn’t on the $20 Bill. She’s Got a Coin, Though.

Almost a decade after the announcement that Harriet Tubman will be the new face of the $20 bill, we’re still getting Jacksons every time we hit the ATM.

Surprised?

The U.S. Mint recently released a Harriet Tubman commemorative coin set (only two years after the bill authorizing them was passed), so I wanted to figure out what the holdup is on the Tubman $20. (And it wasn’t former president Donald Trump, even though he was vocal about opposing it.)

Turns out that the way our White male, same-size greenbacks aren’t problematic only because of the way they look.

The lack of diversity is an obstacle for nearly 7 million Americans who have some form of vision loss, including blindness. A court even said so.

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And because the Treasury Department is legally required to address the accessibility issue first, the popular campaign to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 will take a while to manifest.

This all started with Barbara Ortiz Howard and her Women on 20s campaign in 2015, when her group launched a nationwide election for the new face of the $20.

More than 600,000 people voted. Edging out Eleanor Roosevelt, Rosa Parks and Wilma Mankiller — the first woman elected principal chief of the Cherokee Nation — was Harriet Tubman, who was born into slavery on Maryland’s Eastern Shore.

President Barack Obama endorsed the choice and on April 20, 2016, U.S. Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew issued an open letter:

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But what Lew didn’t explain is the time it’s going to take to make this happen. Or the fact that a 2009 court order requiring the Treasury Department to make our currency easier for the blind and visually impaired is at the front of the line for any changes.

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And this long process is why we won’t even get to Tubman on the $20 until 2030 — a full 14 years since it was announced.

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“Images on U.S. paper currency are reflective of our nation’s values and history,” said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D- N.H.), who has been a vocal advocate of this move. “Some of those most significant chapters were shaped by women, which is why it’s egregious that a woman has never been featured on modern U.S. paper currency.”

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“We have an obligation now as a people to ensure that not only is she remembered and commemorated and celebrated,” Ventris C. Gibson, the director of the U.S. Mint, told Afrotech.

Gibson, a Navy veteran and the first African American to lead the U.S. Mint, said honoring Tubman is important “to make sure that our brothers and sisters have the same experience of getting to a place where they can succeed.”