It won’t solve the civil cases against him that will shortly be going to appeal (where he is most likely to lose)
Hundreds of millions of dollar will be wiped out of his accounts. It’s my belief that this massive loss of liquidity will lead to loan calls and his entire business empire that is built on debt will collapse rapidly in spectacular fashion.
A pardon will help him stay out of prison; it won’t help him avoid losing his appearance of wealth.
ISTM that the president is immune from prosecution while he/she is president. Trump has no need to leave. Certainly not on day #2. Trump would stay and milk it for all it is worth. Maybe he’d resign a month before his term ends and get a pardon from his VP-now president then.
A guy doesn’t undergo a year-long grueling election just to resign on his 2nd day.
(Sorry, responding to OP, somehow selected WhackaMole)
sidenote: By the Federal government. But it remains to be seen what happens when a state wants to arrest and imprison a President, while they are in office. Legally, they go to jail. In reality… 
I predict the opposite. From day 1, he will go all-in on term 3. That will be his entire focus for 4 years. He will go full steam mob boss using every tactic including bribery, intimidation tactics, etc. And I wouldn’t be shocked if he pulled it off.
That’s not how people with a lust for anything behave. Drug addicts don’t say “I’ve finally had the ultimate high, so there’s no reason top smoke weed again.” Multi-billionaires don’t stop making money just because they’re already rich. (Warren Buffet is 93 and still goes into the office.)
Trumps needs are simple: power, admiration, and money. He can never have too much of any of them.
I made the comment in the Pit that, should he win in November, he will begin speechifying about deserving a third term before Inauguration Day 2025.
It’s all about getting more than anyone else. Plus having a contentious issue that will keep all eyes glued on him for at least four years.
Speaking to this point, and not your OP premise yet, here I think you’re correct. He doesn’t want, as others in thread have pointed out the work or the stress associated with the job of being president.
But, IMHO, for a personality like his, there is no cap to the fame he wants. It feeds him in ways that more even keeled individuals cannot fathom, heck, I’d bet more than half of us would shun it like the plague.
As far as Trump is concerned, the only thing being better than worshipped and lauded, is to be worshipped by more people, and he can get that by staying visible, or eliminating the ability of his naysayers to speak out.
Both of which are better served by him remaining in power.
Do I think that he’ll gut government, and then put cronies in charge? Sure, but they’ll get tasked to do his work, or he’ll throw them under the bus and replace them - just like before, but probably worse with record-breaking purges and turnovers.
And he’ll sit around, xitting or twuthing, and threatening any state or local governments by withholding funding if they try to other options. And yes, if he doesn’t fall over dead or otherwise become non-functional, he’ll absolutely pursue a third term and so on until he’s dead or incapable of communication.
I agree with all of this. The only reasons he wants to be president again are to (a) avoid prison, (b) avoid the embarrassing dissolution of his financial house of cards, and (c) seek retribution against his political foes.
One can be thankful that, nearing age 80, it’s not like Trump could have seven consecutive terms in office. A 50-year old Trump would be a different story.
Not a chance. He loves people fawning over him and calling him “sir” in that subservient voice he uses, stroking his ego, etc. And, as mentioned, he wants to exact retribution on his “enemies”. Vengeance takes time.
Should he die in office, his followers will have him declared “eternal president” ala Kim Il Sung with his embalmed body on display under glass next to the Declaration of Independence. That they may continue to rule in his sacred name.
I still disagree.
Sure, Trump gets lots of attention as a former President and as a political power and as a businessman and as a candidate. But not as much attention as he got when he was President. And he’s been there; he knows how much attention he got as President and he wants it back.
And that’s not even getting into the money issue.
Finally, if Trump’s just looking to get re-elected so he can issue himself a pardon, why would he want to resign early? He’d want to hang on to that pardoning power for four full years so he could keep commiting crimes and pardoning himself until 2029.
To be fair, that’s a reasonable assessment of the people he associates with.
He probably will if, for no other reason, that he knows as soon as he leaves the presidency all those criminal court cases will be waiting for him. Only way to avoid that is to stay in office.
Got to come down on the side that says this is unlikely in the extreme. If only for no other reason then resigning means ceding power. Which Trump will never ever do under any circumstances.
Personally I don’t think of trump so much as a politician. He’s more like a concentrated form of greed, venality, and hubris assembled into human form. An avatar of maliciousness.
This is a guy who struggled his whole adult life to be taken seriously by the monied elites in Manhattan who, overwhelmingly, saw him for exactly who he was.
Though he made some money along the way (but inherited more), they never let poor Donald … play in any rich-guy games.
As the apotheosis of ‘failing up,’ he ends up as POTUS. Now, there is a phalanx of people – friend and foe – who must treat him with the kind of respect he never deserved and never got.
And probably a million – who actually do garner the respect of the American masses – who are obligated to salute his dumb ass.
Plus the systemic/systematic grift from the Oval Office.
And his aggressively sought-after Monarchical Immunity.
He couldn’t be dragged out of the WH last time. I definitely wouldn’t put my money on him sashaying out of there before the curtain call if – Og forbid – he got another toehold in that building.
:shudder:
Oh, God. I’m so cold.
He has said it many times in the past and surely will say it again.
But saying it, and doing it, are far apart,
We just saw the President of Senegal try to delay elections after he completed his second term and was term-limited, just as in the United States. He couldn’t do it.
This is not something that happened on another planet. Senegal is not as old a democracy as the U.S., but it has been one for a long time. And destroying democracy in such a country is extremely difficult. I am confident that my country, like Senegal, is great enough to prevent a would-be autocrat like Donald Trump from consolidating dictatorial power.
To be fair, Russia and Turkey leap to mind as two countries who have leaders who managed to extend their term in office beyond what had been legally allowed in their countries.
Which is to say, it can happen.
I mean …
Yeah. Historically … globally … shit happens.