Third U.S. Presidential Term – Here’s How Trump Plans To Do It, And Why Most Likely Will Fail

Third U.S. Presidential Term – Here’s How Trump Plans To Do It, And Why Most Likely Will Fail


April 3rd, 2025 by financetwitter



From annexing Canada to snatching Greenland, and from declaring tariffs war against the world to seeking a third term in the White House, Donald Trump has already created so much chaos that the Russia-Ukraine War and the Israel-Hamas War appears like a child play. And the U.S. president has not even done warming his seat yet in the Oval Office.

His attorney, Boris Epshteyn said he had studied the law – and he believed Trump could find a way to run again in 2028. Mr Trump said this weekend that he was “not joking” about staying in office after his current term ends in January 2029. In an interview with NBC News, he pointed to unnamed “methods” for clinching another four years in office.

Since first winning the presidency in 2016, Trump has been flirting, trolling, flip-flopping and u-turning about the idea of remaining in office beyond two terms – even though he is constitutionally barred from being elected to a third term. Some said he was merely diverting attention from domestic problems, while others said he was enjoying the havoc of making the media crazy.


But if Trump commits to breaking constitutional law, he can expect former president Barack Obama to run too for the third term. The 22nd Amendment says – “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.”

Of course, it can be changed. However, changing the constitution would require a two-thirds approval from both the Senate and the House of Representatives, as well as approval of three-quarters of the U.S.’ state-level governments. While Trump’s Republican Party controls both chambers of Congress, it does not have the majorities needed. Additionally, the Democratic Party controls 18 of the 50 state legislatures.

In other words, even if Trump could change the minds of two-thirds of the Senate (67 out of 100 senators) and the House of Representatives (290 out of 435 congressmen or congresswomen), which he can’t, the Republican Party controls only 28 states – far from 34 required to change the constitution. Republicans currently hold only 218 seats in the House and 53 seats in the Senate.


So, Trump is short of 14 senators, 72 congressmen or congresswomen and 6 states to support him to change the U.S. Constitution. Andy Ogles, a Tennessee Republican in the House of Representatives, introduced a resolution in January proposing for a constitutional amendment to allow a president to serve up to three terms – as long as they were not consecutive.

Coincidentally,the proposal would mean that only Trump of all living presidents would be eligible – Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and George W Bush all served consecutive terms, whereas Trump won in 2016, lost in 2020, and won again in 2024. The hostility and hatred between the Democrats and the Republicans, not to mention even some within Trump’s party think it’s a bad idea, means it was a non-starter.

But Trump supporters say there is a loophole in the constitution, untested in court. They argue that the 22nd Amendment only explicitly bans someone being “elected” to more than two presidential terms – and says nothing of “succession”. Playing with words, they believe Donald Trump does not necessarily need to run for a presidential election to be elected as the POTUS.


Based on this theory, Trump could be the vice-presidential running-mate to another candidate – most likely his own vice-president, JD Vance – in the 2028 election. If they win, Vance could be sworn into the White House as the new U.S. president and then immediately resign – letting Trump to take over by succession. This was also the same game plan of Obama once upon a time when he insisted that he could run for a third term.

That’s based on the assumption that JD Vance would be dumb enough to walk away from the most powerful office on the planet. Still, there’s a huge problem – 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”, effectively closing the loophole that Donald Trump can bypass the U.S. Constitution

That means presidents who have already served two terms are disqualified or prohibited from running as a vice-presidential candidate. Hence, Trump cannot run as a Vice-President after “elected” the maximum two terms as the U.S. president with an evil plan to “serve” as POTUS again for the third term through the “backdoor”. It won’t work even if “President Vance” refuses to resign, but acts as Vice President Trump’s puppet.


The only U.S. president who had served more than two terms was Franklin Roosevelt, who was elected four times (March 4, 1933 – April 12, 1945), although he died three months into his fourth term in April 1945. But it was possible due to the Great Depression and the Second World War. Crucially, at that time, the two-term limit (22nd Amendment in 1951) on U.S. presidents had not been written into law.

It was only after President Franklin D. Roosevelt served an unprecedented four consecutive terms in office that the U.S. realized the problem, leading to Congress passing the 22nd Amendment in 1951 as a constitutional “safeguard” to plug the loophole. But don’t write off Trump’s ability yet. If he becomes extremely popular, two-thirds of the Senate and House and three-quarters of 50 states might be pressured to change the constitution.