House Speaker Mike Johnson poured cold water on President Donald Trump’s flirtation with a third term, saying he doesn’t “see a path” for another run for the White House.
When asked on Tuesday about Trump floating the possibility of a third term, which is barred by the Constitution, Johnson replied, “Well, there’s the 22nd Amendment.”
“It’s been a great run, but I think the president knows, and he and I’ve talked about the constraints of the Constitution,” Johnson told reporters, according to Politico.
The 79-year-old president has long been flirting with the idea of a third term, most recently telling reporters Monday on Air Force One that he “would love to do it.”
The comments come as Trump was asked about an interview his ally Steve Bannon gave to The Economist, in which he said Trump would “get a third term” and “be president in ‘28,” which is when the next presidential election is set to be held.
Despite the 22nd Amendment, which prohibits anyone from serving more than two terms as president, Bannon claimed, “At the appropriate time, we’ll lay out what the plan is.”
When asked if that was something Trump would be willing to challenge at court to be able to do, Trump replied, “I haven’t really thought about it. We have some very good people, as you know, but I have the best poll numbers I’ve ever had.”
Pressed as to who he was referring to by “good people,” Trump pointed to Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. The president then said, “I’m not sure if anybody would run again. I think if they ever formed a group, it would be unstoppable, I do. I really believe that. I would love to do it. I have my best numbers ever.”
A reporter then asked if Trump could circumvent the 22nd Amendment by running as the vice president, which Trump said he could but wouldn’t want to: “I would rule that out because it’s too cute. I think the people wouldn’t like that. It’s too cute. It wouldn’t be right.”
However, running with that plan, Trump would run into issues with the 12th Amendment, which states: “No person constitutionally ineligible to the office of the President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.”
Trump boosted the idea by claiming he “solved” eight wars, an uptick from last month when he took credit for solving seven after he oversaw a peace treaty between Cambodia and Thailand over the weekend.
“I mean, I just solved eight wars and a ninth is coming. I believe Russia-Ukraine will happen,” the president said Monday. “I mean it’s millions of people we saved. I saved the lives of millions of people. That’s what’s important.”
When he was asked directly if he wasn’t ruling out a third term, Trump replied: “Am I not ruling it out? I mean, you’ll have to tell me.”
“All I can tell you is that we have a great group of people, which they don’t,” the president said, seemingly referring to the Democrats.
It’s not the first time Trump has floated the idea of running for a third term.
Just days after winning the 2024 presidential election, Trump told House Republicans: “I suspect I won’t be running again unless you say ‘He’s so good, we got to figure something else out.’”
Days later, he declared at a Las Vegas rally that he was the “most upwardly mobile politician in history, adding that “it will be the greatest honor of my life to serve, not once but twice or three times or four times.”
In March, Trump told Meet the Press he was “not joking” about running for election again.
“A lot of people want me to do it,” the president said at the time. “But, I mean, I basically tell them we have a long way to go, you know, it’s very early in the administration.”
Even before winning the most recent presidential race, Trump seemed keen on a third term.
“We’re going to win four more years in the White House,” he said in 2022. “And then after that, we’ll negotiate, right? Because we’re probably — based on the way we were treated — we are probably entitled to another four after that.”
Despite flirting with the idea, Trump told Time in April 2024 that he didn’t plan on trying to make a third term happen.
“I wouldn’t be in favor of it. I wouldn’t be in favor of a challenge [to the 22nd Amendment]. Not for me,” Trump told the magazine. “I wouldn’t be in favor of it at all. I intend to serve four years and do a great job.”
