Reid Pillifant – Nadler proposes trillion dollar coin trick

Rep. Jerrold Nadler has an admittedly "out of the ordinary" solution to the coming fight over the debt ceiling.

"There is specific statutory authority that says that the Federal Reserve can mint any non-gold or -silver coin in any denomination, so all you do is you tell the Federal Reserve to make a platinum coin for one trillion dollars, and then you deposit it in the Treasury account, and you pay your bills," Nadler said in a telephone interview this afternoon.

I asked whether he was serious.

"I'm being absolutely serious," he said. "It sounds silly but it's absolutely legal. And it would normally not be proper to consider such a thing, except when you're faced with blackmail to destroy the country's economy, you have to consider things."...

Nadler said the trillion-dollar coin was one of two options to avoid the debt ceiling fight; another would be for the president to use his power under the Fourteenth Amendment, which says the validity of the public debt "shall not be questioned." (Nadler tried to press the president toward that option last time, but to no avail.)

"It gets around this artificial debt-ceiling thing which has no economic justification," he said. "And, by the way, by the way, none of this has to be done. All the president would have to say is, 'I would do it if necessary.'" 

CapitalNewYork.com
Nadler proposes trillion dollar coin trick
Reid Pillifant
(h/t Kevin Fathi via email)