I was distressed, but not surprised, when I read the AP headline “Trump says he’s considering ways to serve a third term as president.” Donald Trump is quoted by the AP as saying, “There are methods which you could do it [sic].”
Actually, Trump will be lucky to complete his second term. He could be impeached, assassinated, or die from eating too many Big Macs. Moreover, it is increasingly unlikely that he could be elected again in a free and fair election. (Barring a free and fair election, who knows what could happen!) We should, in any case, take his declaration seriously.
The Twenty-second Amendment, enacted in 1951, clearly intends to prevent anyone from holding the office of president for three terms. Arguably, however, the wording of the amendment is less than air-tight. It prohibits anyone from being elected president more than twice. Section 1 of the amendment begins:
No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once.
The amendment does not explicitly prevent someone who has served two terms as president from becoming president by means other than election, thereby becoming a three-term president. For example, Trump could run as a vice-presidential candidate, say with JD Vance running for the top spot. After the inauguration, Vance could resign, and the vice president, Trump, would become president for virtually an entire third term.
This may or may not be Trump’s plan. My suggestion, while contrary to the intent of the Twenty-second Amendment, is not clearly unconstitutional. Of course, Trump has shown little concern for acting within the restrictions of the Constitution, so he may have a different plan.
Perhaps the trick I suggested may have other complications. The Twelfth Amendment says in part: “But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.” This is more strongly written than the Twenty-second Amendment, speaking of holding, not simply being elected to, the office of president. But does the Twenty-second Amendment disqualify Trump from holding the office of president? (Actually, the Fourteenth Amendment should do that, but the Supreme Court refused to recognize the fact.) If the issue of a third term for Trump arises, the Supreme Court will likely decide what the law really is.
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