Trump Won’t Rule Out 3rd White House Term — Can He Really Run?
President Trump left the door open to a third White House term on Monday, leading to questions about whether he is trolling Democrats or actually serious about circumventing the Constitution’s two-term limit. At the same time, Trump is also dismissing the idea of running as vice president in 2028 — one way some allies, including former adviser Steve Bannon, believe he can find a way back to the White House, again.
Aboard Air Force One on Monday, a reporter asked if he’d rule out another run. He noted that he has his “best poll numbers” he’s ever had, and said: “Am I not ruling it out? You’ll have to tell me,” but then also floated Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio as formidable candidates.
All the talk has one major roadblock: The 22nd Amendment, which bars anyone from being elected to the presidency more than twice. However, it doesn’t explicitly say that someone couldn’t serve again. That’s where some unconventional, and untested, workarounds have been floated.
HOW THIS MIGHT ACTUALLY PLAY OUT:
1. One option would be that Trump could run as vice president on the 2028 ticket. He’d then have the president resign, giving VP Trump the presidency. Trump on Monday called that method “too cute.”
Pushback: The 12th Amendment says: “No person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.” Since Trump has served two terms as president, he would be ineligible to be VP.
However, fringe legal theorists argue that because the 12th was written before the 22nd, Trump could still technically be eligible for VP — but most constitutional scholars dismiss that outright, saying the Supreme Court would never allow it.
“It is, of course, true that we had no Twenty-Second Amendment when the Twelfth Amendment was ratified, but its effect is to make the qualifications for the two offices, [president and vice president], identical,” Georgetown Law’s David Super told FactCheck.org.
2. Another option that could be tried is for Republicans to elect him Speaker of the House (you don’t have to be a member of Congress to be speaker), then ascend to the presidency if both president and vice president were vacated. But if the VP idea is too “cute,” one could argue this is even cuter and also goes against the spirit of the law.
3. The other theory is that Trump is simply trolling Democrats — and it’s working.
“President Trump is of the mindset that when he makes the Left’s heads explode, he has a PR win — not only with his base, but eventually something happens and he says, ‘See, I told you they’re crazy,” Fox News anchor Bret Baier recently told Mo News. “He says something that raises a lot of eyebrows. There’s a ton of reaction to it, almost overreaction. Then the wheel comes back and people say, ‘What’s the deal with that?’”
And as long as speculation about 2028 lingers, the spotlight stays on Trump — not on potential successors and delaying his lame duck status.
THE AGE FACTOR
Trump will be 82 years old at the end of the current term — 86 by the end of another. That said, Baier pushed back on speculation about Trump’s age and stamina, recounting a recent Air Force One trip to Alaska where Trump conducted interviews and stayed on the phone “the entire flight back” — keeping a longer and tougher schedule than the press corps.
“I had to go sit and sleep,” Baier said. “He’s got this energy that’s nonstop. I don’t see him slowing down — I think that’s a misperception.”
Bottom line: Don’t expect Trump to put away the “Trump 2028” hats anytime soon. A real bid for a third term would almost certainly require a constitutional amendment — or face swift rejection in the courts. At the same time, Trump has never shied away from testing constitutional limits.