The OP doesn’t specify winning the election, just if the GOP could get him on the ballot. Who’s to say that with the Court in his back pocket, he wouldn’t try all sorts of crazy scenarios in the hope that the Supremes will try their gaslighting techniques that bear no resemblance to the law? After all, and what’s often forgotten, is that their word is final, and they’re a fanatical bunch of right-wing ideologues who will literally do anything to keep the GOP in power. Push comes to shove, who says they won’t declare that Trump is right saying that the purple states had a fixed election and throw the election to him? If they did, we would have to suck it up.
Nope, not according to the Colorado case. Colorado tried to keep an ineligible person off the ballot, and the federal courts said no.
That leads to another possible argument. When states try to take him off of the ballot, the courts say “the Constitution says he can’t be elected, not that he can’t run. Keep him on the ballot, and if he wins, then we’ll worry about it”. Then he wins, and it’s challenged, and the courts say “Well you should have thought of that before he ran; it’s too late now.”.
I’m just not seeing it. Yes, the SC has handed down some decisions that found for the GOP and Trump, and thus were bitterly decried. They’ve also ruled against Trump. What I’m seeing is that the 6-3 majority is small-c conservative and consistently rules in favor of originalism and the cold letter of the Constitution. That’s a particular stance of judicial philosophy but it is not inherently “pro-Trump”.
The real blame should be pointed at the expansion of presidential powers at the expense of Congress since the FDR administration onwards, to the point where half or more of the American public thinks we’re electing a king every four years. We’re just now seeing what happens when a so-empowered executive is in the hands of a right-wing demagogue instead of a liberal or a moderate.
The nice thing about originalism and the cold letter of the Constitution is that they’re in direct opposition to one another, so when one doesn’t give you the answer you want, you can switch to the other.
I think that could actually be a mechanism under which Trump could create his figleaf. I think this, using Kenobi’s quote, isn’t probable, but far short of nutty.
I can see a scenario where depending on how the wind blows in 2026, realizes he’s at risk, so before he actually loses the house (Please, FSM, please) in terms of seated representation, he provokes a response in some blue state, such as California. One of his classic, I’ll do it and ignore the judges until after all the damage is/can be done. When that state attempts to hold him accountable by words or legal action, he climbs up on his unassailable social media platform and declares a number of blue states to be in succession, and thus, their votes are not binding on the actual USA. The same way the Confederates weren’t eligible to true representation in the government they left.
No, it’s not the same thing remotely, but Trump can make his case using the same sort of language @napier quoted upthread.
Boom, now he purges the representation of states that aren’t already in his hands. And he could therefore use the following time to pass any number of amendments to the Constitution as voted upon by the “legitimate” states of the USA, pushing hard on the needs of the emergency and unique situation.
Given a chance to rollback any number of amendments, or even just pushing for a “clarification” of uncertain language, would be very popular with quite a lot of his base, and that’s without even putting a finger on the scales of who is getting to do the counts and verification of those votes.
Now personally, I think this scenario is beyond Trump’s planning, but probably is well within the realms of some of his supporters. And once it’s started by Trump’s 2am uncontrolled twuthing/xitting, a LOT of people are going to figure, as they have until now, that it’s better to be at Satan’s left hand than in his path. And if the response to the initial provocation is sufficiently serious, I can see the SCOTUS giving him the figleaf. After all, the Civil War provides a lot of cover fire for dismissing the claims of insurrectionists.
And it would also give reason to such “insurrectionists” to defect - after all, if you get the Presidential Pardon, you likely would be able to restore any confiscated assets (minus any bribes) while serving as examples of how you were misled by the evil THEM, increasing the perceived legitimacy.
Do I think it would fully work? No, I think it would be an epic disaster ending with an endless simmer of rebellions (minor and not so) that would make Putin’s Russia look overwhelmingly successful. But it’s possible, and maybe even plausible, while technically working within an existing historical framework.
The Court said that it’s up to Congress to determine if someone is ineligible under the 14th amendment, not the states. I don’t think you would want a Republican SecState in North Carolina or Ohio deciding that a Democratic candidate is an insurrectionist for questioning Dear Leader in public and then throwing them off the ballot, would you?
Have we gotten to the point where both illegal and violent are inside the definition of non-nutty? Not possible or probable or conceivable but non-nutty? Every time my eyes go to the top of the screen I see that word. Yeah, no.
You bet I’m ranting.
The government and the courts have allowed a large amount of illegal and violent actions as being within the scope of Presidential power. Or at least, that said actions cannot be held against the President, while those who carry them out are of course, pardonable!
I think we’re at the stage where if sanity is determined by the majority (or at least, the majority of the people with power/money) then yes, it’s non-nutty. I’ve lost track of the threads where one or more of us have said we’re living in a post-rational society.
In that case, the remaining semi-rational (you guys may feel free to define yourself as fully rational, but I know my limits) individuals are the un-sane ones.
But if you want to boil it down, I’m laying out a scenario where the 22nd is removed by actions of electors. That is a non-nutty way to overcome the OP’s question - just the timeframe would ordinarily be very hard to manage in time (or popularity) to manage a third Trump term.
But, you insist, it would be up to the states, not Congress, to determine if someone is ineligible under the 22nd amendment. Do you see why we’re not all as sanguine as you are?
One is a question of whether a person is guilty of a crime. That requires a federal trial and a conviction.
The other is a question of whether someone has already been elected twice. That’s a simple determination of fact that doesn’t require adjudication, as several courts determined last year that states could refuse to list Cenk Uygur as a candidate since he isn’t a natural-born citizen.
[quot=“ParallelLines, post:88, topic:1025218”]
I’m laying out a scenario where the 22nd is removed by actions of electors.
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Having gotten there through a series of illegal and violent actions.
If your argument is based on the supposition that currently illegal actions will be made conveniently legal, there’s not much you couldn’t postulate. I still say you’re in the genre of political fiction at that point.
I’m old enough to remember when there was an actual small genre of political fiction in the 60s and 70s. Much of it came out of people playing with succession and postulating ways the Speaker of the House or a cabinet secretary would become president; all the myriad threads here about the 25th amendment were thoroughly explored back then.
A very small number, however, had the common factor of a third party candidate appealing to the voters by creating a platform that combined common threads of policies that people on all sides wanted and the parties weren’t giving them. Americans were good people and would come together to achieve good things. (None of them touched on racism that I remember. Why spoil a pretty picture?)
Today’s political fiction is as dystopian as the rest of fiction. We live in dystopian times, certainly. Dystopias sell in a way they never did in the optimistic futures of the 1960s. People revel in inventing and/or reading about the horridest of horrendous futures. Their commonality makes me contrary: betting against the consensus always works in the long run.
Assuming we have a long run.
Sometimes I swear there are gonna be people on the left who’ll be disappointed if Trump doesn’t become a dictator.
None of which are, technically illegal. Because only the “main” government gets to decide what insurrection is apparently. And so far… well, they’ve given vast tolerance of what is and is not insurrection. By any rational (non-nutty) definition of what happened on Jan 6, well, Trump is.
Sending in troops to deal with “drug smugglers” in California, would, as things stand right now be likely to at least pass as legal and non-violent, or, rather, legal and justifiable violence. If a state did take action to beyond crying to the courts about it (which we’ve had countless court injunctions flat out ignored because “the prez said so”), then Trump would have little pushback to declare them insurrectionists - even if it was simple as adding a tax to federal agencies/property.
Look, I’ll repeat, as I said, none of this is currently probable, just plausible. And again, which I mentioned explicitly in the post you quoted, is just a mechanism by which a perfectly legal and not-nutty repeal of the 22nd via electoral action could happen fast enough to cover Trump ver. 3.
I think that when you’re talking about the president deploying the military to murder American citizens under false pretenses we’ve gone far past “non-nutty”.
As one of the more pessimistic posters here on this topic, I will say – of course I’m hoping that I’m wrong, but I’m doing the best that I can do to be prepared.
I may have mentioned it here, but there was a reddit post from one of the “left wing prepper” subs that opened my eyes earlier this year. As we collectively were watching the chaos unfold, and talk of civil war started, a lot of people flocked to these subs looking for advice – do we buy guns? Ammo? Stock up on MREs?
The post said, very briefly summarized, “You don’t need guns or a bunker. What you need to be prepared for is being poor. Most people don’t know how to be poor.” Well goddamn if that didn’t get me right where I was at, comfortably middle class without any idea how to live on even half my salary.
Looking at other countries that have had regime changes, that advice seems spot on.
Since then, I’ve made fairly dramatic changes to my life. I’ve drastically cut back on expenses and tried to save every dollar I can (I’m now living on half my salary, huzzah!). I’ve quit my expensive hobby and made sure that everything I do for “fun” can also be turned into a potential income stream, especially via bartering. I’ve embarked on a potential career change so that I’m less dependent on the federal government for a job if I need to pivot (I’m uniquely qualified for DoD software engineering gigs and not a whole lot else).
I’m not worried about being marched off to the gulags, or having to defend my home from roving invaders, or being enlisted to fight on the front lines against ICE. But I am taking this very, very seriously, and I encourage others to as well. You can interpret that how you like, but remaining hopeful isn’t gonna pay the bills when the oligarchs get to dictate everything and all of our jobs get turned upside down.
What does this have to do with pessimism? Personally, I would not be doing this if I were trying to remain blissfully hopeful that the midterms will be like normal midterms and the balance of power will flip at least somewhat. I needed to accept that living under a fascist dictatorship was a real possibility. Once that hit home, I was able to act.
Right. True, two new members of the court were picked by trump as Roe killers. But Gorsuch has proved to be an old school conservative, and not in trumps pocket- along with Roberts, and of course the three liberal-types. Thomas is just plain out there, leaving Barrett and Kavanaugh as in his pocket. Neither of who were all that qualified anyway, except they were willing to lie to Congress, then kill Roe.
Yes, there is a only sorta nutty way- House elects youknowwho to Speaker, then the two sacrificial volunteers both resign.
For example?
Yep.
Mind you, the chance he will even be alive by 2028 is not certain.
I think we’ll have to agree to disagree then. Because “nutty” is subjective. If I were asking if it were nutty, by say 2012 standards? Nuttier than a fruitcake then.
Nutty by 2025 standards? I don’t think it is.
For that matter, I haven’t even talked about moving into a hot war for a minute, so I’m puzzled at your assertion. All I’ve said so far is that Trump could use misquoted or hyperbolic communication as a pretext (which he’s done so many times and with less to gain) to disenfranchise a large number of his political enemies, and then in the aftermath propose and push through a completely legal and legitimate (with precedent!) political solution of removing the 22nd without firing a shot.
If those ejected states fight back, then, yes he’d have the pretext he likely wants to send in troops, and a powerful fig leaf under which to do so. He’d have a tremendous bludgeon to force the states to later compromise and come back, though again, I said I doubted it would be successful.
Sure, you’re right to be dismissive of the nuttiness if I had said “Send in the troops to kill 90% of the blue voters” so the election is an easy win, but that’s NOT what I’ve said.
He mostly rules by decree. If you compare him to a dictator in the Roman Republic, he probably has lesser limitations
A lot of Americans think George III was a dictator. Trump certainly exercises more power than that guy did.
Whether Trump will exercise his rule by decree power to run for a third term, I tend to think not. But I’m far from sure. And the only people who can stop him from running again are the voters. If enough are against it, SCOTUS will get the message, as with Cenk Uygur, and uphold the Constitution. But SCOTUS will not stop a Republican who seems to have a chance of victory.
As to whether Trump could win, he has always been a weak candidate in the sense that most GOP congressional candidates do better than he does. Candidate quality matters a little but not as much as I would like. If he continues to luck out with the economy, he could win.
For example, sending SEALs to kill off members of the Supreme Court that they disagree with. That’s something that the majority of the current Supreme Court has said would be a “legitimate exercise of executive authority”.
Why is that at all surprising? It’d be a rare President indeed who could outperform the average Congressmember of his party. Has any President ever met that threshold?
That’s a gross exaggeration/ mischaracterization/ oversimplification of Trump v. United States.