Trump Trolls the Media Again With New Comments on Running for Reelection in 2028

President Trump engaged in a little presidential trolling on Sunday when he was on a phone interview with NBC News. When asked about a possible 2028 re-election run - forbidden by the Constitution in the 22nd Amendment - he responded with a typical Trump tease.

President Donald Trump did not rule out the possibility of seeking a third term in the White House, which is prohibited by the Constitution under the 22nd Amendment, saying in an exclusive interview with NBC News that there were methods for doing so and clarifying that he was “not joking.”
“A lot of people want me to do it,” Trump said in a Sunday-morning phone call with NBC News, referring to his allies. “But, I mean, I basically tell them we have a long way to go, you know, it’s very early in the administration.”
“I’m focused on the current,” Trump added, in some of his most extensive comments to date about serving a third term.

That's a pretty clear non-answer, but the president had more to say on the topic - and he claims he's not joking. He even proposes one avenue where he may - pending a legal ruling - be able to pull it off:

When asked whether he wanted another term, the president responded, “I like working.”
“I’m not joking,” Trump said, when asked to clarify. “But I’m not — it is far too early to think about it.”
When asked whether he has been presented with plans to allow him to seek a third term, Trump said, “There are methods which you could do it.”
NBC News asked about a possible scenario in which Vice President JD Vance would run for office and then pass the role to Trump. Trump responded that “that’s one” method.
“But there are others too,” Trump added.
Asked to share another method, Trump simply responded “no.”

The 22nd Amendment is, of course, the roadblock to any such plan. And the workaround President Trump mentions likely won't work; here's why. The notion of Vice President Vance, on winning the election with Donald Trump as his running mate, then resigning and handing the presidency off - it's unclear as to whether the 22nd Amendment prohibits such an action. The 22nd Amendment reads in part:

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.

President Trump would, in this scenario, not have been "elected to the office of the President," but to the office of Vice President. And Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution, says about the qualifications of the President:

No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.

Here's the catch: The 12th Amendment lays out the qualifications for the Vice President of the United States, and that's where this scheme hits a brick wall:

But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.

That, bluntly, prohibits any previous two-term president from running for vice president. There are no other ways around the 22nd Amendment that I'm aware of.

Even so, this is, at least in the opinion of this writer, unlikely. President Trump will be 82 when his current term ends, and JD Vance is more than capable, should he choose, of taking the reins. President Trump has expressed this notion before, and it's very likely he's, as my British friend would say, "Having them on."

The President has a strangely familiar knack for distraction.

And it's also likely that he was flashing a little annoyance at being asked this, when, as my colleague Mike Miller informs us, he has much more serious matters on his plate; in fact, he described one such issue in this same interview. Trump also spoke about Iran in another part of the Welker interview.

Iran Rejects Talks With US, Trump Vows 'Bombing Like You've Never Seen Before'

Prediction: President Trump won't seek a third term by the means described above or any other means. He's likely doing a bit of leg-pulling here with this suggestion, as he is wont to do. But in 2028, he will be, as noted, 82 years old, and no matter how robust he is for a man his age - and he's pretty robust - time is that inexorable villain that catches up with all of us, eventually, as I'm reminded every time I look in the mirror. And by 2028, even the most die-hard MAGA fan will likely agree with the notion that President Trump has done enough.

But we can still enjoy him, now and then, when talking with the media, pointing away and shouting "Squirrel!"

The mainstream media continues to deflect, gaslight, spin, and lie.

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