FILE - In this March 2, 2006, file photo, a $10 bill, featuring a likeness of Andrew Hamilton, the first U.S. Treasury secretary, is displayed at the National Archives gift shop, in Washington. U.S. Treasury officials declined to comment Monday, April 18, 2016, on the specifics of a CNN report that Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew has decided to keep Hamilton on the $10 bill, and instead replace seventh U.S. President Andrew Jackson's portrait on the $20 bill with a woman who represents the struggle for racial equality. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File) (Copyright 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.)
The man who has become a major star through the unlikely vehicle of the country's first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, thinks it's "crazy" that he may have played a part in keeping "the $10 founding father" on the bill.
The creator and star of the Broadway smash "Hamilton," Lin-Manuel Miranda, spoke to Fox News Latino just before heading into a matinee performance when the news broke that U.S. Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew reportedly has decided the founding father will remain on the $10 while Underground Railroad founder, Harriet Tubman, will replace Andrew Jackson on the $20.
“That’s crazy,” Miranda said when FNL broke the news of the announcement to him, and added that Hamilton "would be thrilled" about Tubman, who will become the first woman on U.S. paper currency in 100 years.
A Treasury Department official, who spoke on condition of anonymity ahead of Lew’s official announcement, said an image of the 19th-century abolitionist would replace Jackson, the nation's seventh president.
A number of prominent people and groups, among them Women on 20s, wanted the change because the $20 is a more commonly-utilized bill.
But some people will credit Miranda, whose hit show helped turn the once-obscure former Treasury Secretary into a cult favorite.
Miranda’s widely successful hip-hop musical has changed the way Americans think about history, musicals, education and the Founding Fathers. And the way people think about Hamilton, who is now considered cool by a growing number of millennials across the country.
Miranda, however, put a historical perspective on the announcement.
“What I’ll tell you is that the first person to put women on currency was Alexander Hamilton. He put Lady Liberty on the earliest U.S. currency – before all of y’all,” he told FNL. “So I think he’d be thrilled that women are being represented in our currency.”
Miranda, who won a Pulitzer Prize on Monday for his show, continued: “I think Aaron Burr [the former U.S. vice president who killed Hamilton in a duel] would be even more thrilled. Burr would be happier if Hamilton was off, but he would be thrilled. He was an ardent feminist and raised his daughter Theodosia, with the same schooling that young men at the time got.”
Lew's announcement is expected to provide details on other changes being made to the $20, $10 and $5 bills.
The group Women on 20s said it would not claim victory unless Lew also committed to issuing the new $20 bill at the same time that the redesigned $10 bill is scheduled to be issued in 2020.
The $10 bill is the next note scheduled to be redesigned to introduce updated protections against counterfeiting. That redesign was scheduled to be unveiled in 2020, which marks the 100th anniversary of women getting the right to vote. Lew had often cited that connection as a reason to put a woman on the $10 bill.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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