MAGA acolyte Steve Bannon is currently floating the idea that Donald Trump could run for a third presidential term, even though the United States Constitution says otherwise.
During a speech at the New York Young Republican Club’s Gala on Sunday night, the former Trump chief strategist suggested that the 22nd Amendment – which states that presidents can not be elected more than twice – didn’t apply to Trump because the president-elect’s terms are non-consecutive.
Fresh off of serving a four-month prison stint for contempt of Congress over his refusal to testify in the January 6 hearings, Bannon riled up the pro-Trump crowd by reveling in the fact that the incoming president will be sworn into office next month. He then cited MAGA lawyer Mike Davis, a former Supreme Court clerk who has anointed himself Trump’s “viceroy,” to insist that Trump could seek a third election.
“Donald John Trump is going to raise his hand on the King James Bible and take the oath of office, his third victory and his second term,” the War Room podcaster exclaimed. “And the viceroy Mike Davis tells me – since it doesn’t actually say consecutive – that, I don’t know, maybe we do it again in ‘28? Are you guys down for that? Trump ‘28?! Come on, man!”
Regardless of what Bannon and Davis believe, the 22nd Amendment – ratified in 1951 and introduced after Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected four consecutive terms – clearly states that U.S. presidents are limited to two full terms.
“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 states.
Bannon imploring Trump to throw his hat into the ‘28 ring, when the president-elect would be 82 years old, isn’t exactly coming out of nowhere.
A week after Trump defeated Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, it was reported that he mused to Republican lawmakers about the possibility of Congress making it possible for him to serve a third term.
“I suspect I won’t be running again, unless you do something,” Trump reportedly said during a meeting with GOP House members. “Unless you say, ‘He’s so good, we have to just figure it out.’”
Trump, who left the White House in shame after unsuccessfully trying to overturn his 2020 election loss, repeatedly suggested during the presidential campaign that he might serve longer than the one term the Constitution limited him to. That is, whenever he wasn’t raising the prospect of violating other democratic norms, such as saying he’d be a “dictator” only on “day one” of his presidency, prompting Democrats to sound the “fascist” alarm bells about a Trump presidency.
“You know, FDR 16 years — almost 16 years — he was four terms. I don’t know, are we going to be considered three-term? Or two-term?” Trump declared at a National Rifle Association event in May.
“Christians, get out and vote. Just this time,” he told a gathering of religious conservatives in July. “You won’t have to do it anymore, you know what? Four more years, it’ll be fixed, it’ll be fine, you won’t have to vote anymore, my beautiful Christians.”
Bannon sparking raucous applause from the MAGA faithful over the possibility of a Trump ‘28 campaign wasn’t the only eye-opening moment at Sunday night’s black-tie affair.
While introducing incoming White House deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino, Trump campaign adviser Alex Bruesewitz collapsed on stage after slurring his words and staring blankly at the crowd. After he was rushed off stage, organizers of the vent reassured attendees that Bruesewitz and that the likely cause was “dehydration” and “locked legs.”
