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Topics: Donald Trump, Elon Musk, US News, Politics, Money
Callum Jones
Topics: Donald Trump, Elon Musk, US News, Politics, Money
Donald Trump has announced plans to stop minting 'wasteful' pennies as he continues his plan to slash spending in the US.
Today marks exactly three weeks since President Trump returned to the Oval Office for a second term, and he's introduced a number of changes in that short space of time.
The Republican president has signed off on many orders - which have included halting the ban of TikTok, and declaring that there are 'only two genders' among others.
Meanwhile, he's also renamed the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, and set up the very first US wealth fund.
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Now, Trump has announced plans for the US Treasury to stop producing pennies, forming part of his plan to cut spend.
The POTUS claimed minting pennies is 'wasteful' and that they cost more than their value to make.
Taking to Truth Social, the 47th POTUS said: "For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents.
"This is so wasteful! I have instructed my Secretary of the US Treasury to stop producing new pennies. Let's rip the waste out of our great nations budget, even if it's a penny at a time."
The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), the governmental department headed up by Elon Musk, has previously stated minting pennies is costing American taxpayers tens of millions of dollars.
DOGE is a temporary organization set up by Trump that aims to 'dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies'.
The president shared the news of its creation in November last year and named Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy as the two people that would lead it.
It's since been reported that the Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, agreed to allow a team who works under DOGE to oversee the Treasury's payment system, which is charge of distributing things like Americans’ tax returns, Social Security benefits, disability payments and federal employees’ salaries.
It's believed these team members in question have been able to access the critical payment system since Trump's inauguration on January 20, but a federal judge recently halted this.
US District Judge Paul Engelmayer issued the order in question, which also tells DOGE members to destroy any downloaded information from the payment system, CNN reports.
A hearing on the matter is scheduled for February 14.