# If a less than 2 term president is impeached and thrown out of office, can s/he be reelected? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 12, 2018, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256 "2018-04-12T00:57:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2018, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/21 "2018-04-13T10:47:05Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Moore was removed from office, but was it via an impeachment process? No, it was through a separate process. Alabama has a special court that deals with complaints against judges. ---
**Author:** ![Sasquatch\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8491ac/32.png) [@Sasquatch\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sasquatch_1)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2018, 10:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/22 "2018-04-13T10:53:59Z")
Is there anything stopping someone from being a serial Vice President succeeding to the Presidency? I guess if you’re a two-term president, you can pick a replacement and be the Vice President. Either the power behind the POTUS, or just bump him off after the election to get a third term. If this is legit, you could even do it multiple times. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2018, 11:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/23 "2018-04-13T11:16:20Z")
You can’t be elected VP after serving two terms as POTUS. It’s possible that you could be appointed VP but that requires a vacancy and Congress to vote you in. Not easy to arrange that. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2018, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/24 "2018-04-14T00:36:54Z")
> [@Sasquatch](#): > > Is there anything stopping someone from being a serial Vice President succeeding to the Presidency? No. The 22nd Amendment says there are some people who can be elected president twice, and other people who can only be elected president once (and one person who can be elected an infinite number of times, but he’s dead). It does not create a category of people who can never be elected, so if you’re _never_ elected, you never bump into the limits at all. Take Gerald Ford. He served a little more than two years of Nixon’s second term, so he was only eligible to be elected once, which he never got to use (he tried). In 1980, he was almost elected vice president again (he ultimately turned down the offer and Reagan had to scramble to get Bush on the ticket). In 1981, Reagan almost died. Had things been a little different, Gerald Ford would have gone into 1984 having served the majority of two terms as president, without impacting his own eligibility for a further term. ---
**Author:** ![Sasquatch\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8491ac/32.png) [@Sasquatch\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sasquatch_1)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2018, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/25 "2018-04-28T15:34:10Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > You can’t be elected VP after serving two terms as POTUS. It’s possible that you could be appointed VP but that requires a vacancy and Congress to vote you in. Not easy to arrange that. Just checking back in on this, I stopped to do a little research and can’t see where this is true. It doesn’t seem there are any limits at all to just being the VP. It seems in theory one person could be the VP for multiple Presidents running, and could even succeed to the Presidency multiple times. Just that you couldn’t actually run and be elected as President. Being a past President doesn’t stop a person from being a VP, and a VP isn’t technically elected. So Barack Obama, for example, could be the VP for the next Democratic candidate, win, and then become President again if the original POTUS departs. And then repeat the next term, so long as he just starts out as the VP. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2018, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/26 "2018-04-28T16:15:50Z")
Untrue. The [12th amendment](https://system.uslegal.com/executive-branch/vice-president/) specifically states that no one ineligible to be President is allowed to be Vice President. So Obama, having been elected twice, is ineligible to be Vice President. After all, it’s pretty much the sum total of the job: being there to take over if things go south for the President. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2018, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/27 "2018-04-28T21:06:05Z")
One can make a case that Obama is not ineligible to _be_ President; he’s just ineligible to _elected_ President, and that he could thus become President through a different route. All this really means, though, is that our laws are poorly written. Neither the judicial courts nor the court of public opinion is likely to agree with this interpretation. ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2018, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/28 "2018-04-30T03:23:02Z")
> [@turtlescanfly](#): > > Presumably, their opponent would simply have to run ads that say “Hey, at least I wasn’t impeached!” or “Hey, remember when you hated that guy so much you threw him out?” But for the case of one side having 2/3rds of the vote, and throwing the opposition out. 'Hey, you 30, you are all impeached and 29 of you are banned from holding office again ! nanananana !" Its very unlikely that there be a party with 2/3rds of the votes… but it wouldn’t be so simple for the opposition of that one man ( who was ejected but not banned) would it ? Thats probably why governments don’t impeach opposition members without good cause… It gives the opposition the underdog status. Well except in Russia and other dictatorships with fake democracy. Malaysia, Thailand… ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2018, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/29 "2018-04-30T18:07:07Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > I would have found it hard to imagine that we could have elected a shady real estate con-artist / reality TV show personality / serial adulterer / pathological liar as president, too, so stranger things have happened. > [@kenobi\_65](#): > > Good example. Moore was like Dracula, if Dracula were a big fan of the Ten Commandments and teenaged girls. > [@friedo](#): > > We live in a country where people elect convicted crackheads mayor of the nation’s capital. Anything is possible. **Moderator Note** Let’s leave political commentary out of General Questions. Colibri General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![zev\_steinhardt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/97f17d/32.png) [@zev\_steinhardt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zev_steinhardt)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2018, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/30 "2018-04-30T18:23:17Z")
n/m… mentioned Alcee Hastings, but I see someone already beat me to it. Zev Steinhardt ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2018, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/31 "2018-04-30T18:55:51Z")
> [@turtlescanfly](#): > > I find it hard to imagine a scenario in which an elected official who had been impeached COULD win another election The Senate did not impose future disqualification on Hastings in recognition of the inconvenient fact that he had been acquitted at his criminal trial for corruption, when the key witness clammed up. Hastings then got elected to the House by playing the race card. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2018, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256/32 "2018-05-01T15:13:59Z")
> [@turtlescanfly](#): > > I find it hard to imagine a scenario in which an elected official who had been impeached COULD win another election, regardless of whether there were legal barriers. Curious if you meant merely impeached like Andrew Johnson (who did not win re-election) or impeached & convicted a la Alcee Hastings. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-a-less-than-2-term-president-is-impeached-and-thrown-out-of-office-can-s-he-be-reelected/812256.md?page=1)