Trump Third Term Update

President Trump has repeatedly hinted at the possibility of finding a way around the Constitution to pursue a third term in office, but a new poll released Wednesday shows most Republicans are not on board with the idea.

According to a Reuters/Ipsos survey conducted last week, 53 percent of Republican respondents said Trump should not run for a third term. Among all those surveyed, nearly two-thirds said they opposed another Trump presidential bid in 2028. Trump, now 78, has continued to publicly explore the idea, despite the clear constitutional prohibition against it.

The 22nd Amendment, which was ratified in 1951 following President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s unprecedented four elections, bars anyone from being elected to the presidency more than twice. Still, Trump has shown no hesitation in suggesting he might seek a workaround.

“I’m not joking,” Trump said in a recent interview with NBC News, referring to a third-term run. “There are methods,” he added, without offering details. When speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump went further, saying, “I’m not looking at that, but I’ll tell you, I have had more people ask me to have a third term which in a way is a fourth term, because the other election the 2020 election was totally rigged. So it’s actually sort of a fourth term.”

That claim echoes Trump’s continued insistence that the 2020 election was stolen, a baseless assertion that culminated in the Capitol riot on January 6, 2021, when a group of his supporters stormed the Capitol in an attempt to block the certification of President Biden’s victory.

The same Reuters/Ipsos poll shows Trump’s approval rating dipping to 42 percent, the lowest point of his second term. When he returned to the White House in January, his approval stood at 47 percent, according to the same pollster.

While Trump continues to command significant influence within the Republican Party, the polling suggests that even many of his own supporters are hesitant about the prospect of him extending his time in office beyond the constitutional limit.