This is stupid, everyone knows what the 22nd Amendment means, which is that you can't run three times. Laws only work to the extent that we agree to follow them and dignifying idiotic word games like this is tantamount to agreeing that the laws don't matter. - ThreadSky

whstancil.bsky.social • 67 days ago

This is stupid, everyone knows what the 22nd Amendment means, which is that you can't run three times. Laws only work to the extent that we agree to follow them and dignifying idiotic word games like this is tantamount to agreeing that the laws don't matter.

Reposted from Mark Joseph Stern

Chatted with @dahlialithwick.bsky.social about the (probably) constitutional way that Trump could finagle a third presidential term 😬 slate.com/news-and-pol...

Comments

wdustice9.bsky.social•67 days ago

I think it’s important to discuss things that Trump is very likely to try to do given he doesn’t feel the law applies to him. Pretending it can’t happen isn’t overly useful

joekalicki.bsky.social•67 days ago

The only worthy discussion is how long we allow politicians and judges to tarnish our laws and rights before the guns come out. Everything else is masturbation.

wdustice9.bsky.social•67 days ago

Yeah, I mean who knows. A lot of countries drift into authoritarianism and nobody really does anything about it for 10-25 years. I hope that’s not us but it’s the most common outcome

digifox.binaryden.net•67 days ago

We've already played idiotic word games to justify regulations that contravene the first and second amendments, as well as blatant violations of the 4th amendment.

digifox.binaryden.net•67 days ago

Civil forfeiture is the dumbest workaround for the 4th amendment

digifox.binaryden.net•67 days ago

Regardless of whether you consider the goal of any of these workarounds reasonable, they are still, ultimately, stupid word games

joekalicki.bsky.social•67 days ago

The fourth amendment no longer exists in any meaningful context.

elkeerickson.bsky.social•67 days ago

Where the Trump family is concerned, it's never unreasonable to prepare for the worst.

haskell.bsky.social•67 days ago

He can't be on the ticket as VP because he's ineligible for the office, that's it

mrthursday.bsky.social•67 days ago

That is explicitly stated in the 12th amendment.

allengarvin.bsky.social•67 days ago

The exaggerated finger-quote "work-around" is the 22th amendment does not use the magic word "ineligible". It simply says "shall [not] be elected to the office of the President more than twice".

And, thus: being elected to VP does not violate that very picky semantic parsing.

haskell.bsky.social•67 days ago

Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.

joekalicki.bsky.social•67 days ago

It literally forbids that explicitly

kimphilbywasbad.bsky.social•67 days ago

I like the scenario because Trump would murder Junior five minutes after being sworn in as VP

lordgonz.bsky.social•67 days ago

You’ve succinctly described the last 20 years of conservative jurisprudence

lordgonz.bsky.social•67 days ago

Felt like this with impeachment and Emoluments too. It’s just so obvious that these provisions described his behaviors, yet we got caught up in months of hairsplitting and legalistic word games.

branewave.bsky.social•67 days ago

Everyone knows that the 22nd amendment allows you to be VP, become president when your guy gets impeached, and then get elected outright as president two times. The 22nd doesn’t say it has to happen in that order.

readingcabbage.bsky.social•67 days ago

Well see Will the 22nd amendment wasn't, contra popular belief, about limiting the number of times an individual could be president. It was merely a limit as to how many times they could be on the top of the ticket in an election!

witwarrior.bsky.social•67 days ago

The limitation on Trump’s power is Mother Nature and Father Time.
Also, I really doubt that Don Jr could be trusted to step down after being elected. Why should he?

dissenterbedamned.bsky.social•66 days ago

The highest levels of legal study and power in the US agree that bribery is ok as long as you call it by another name, acknowledging that laws are simply semantic games that rich people play is simply living in reality. Baseless optimism is useless.

no-obey-advance.bsky.social•67 days ago

I love mocking the British for their antiquated systems of government, but an unwritten just vaguely follow the precedent system is more logical than whatever this is.

dreyfussaffair.bsky.social•67 days ago

Right, but this type of convoluted over-reading of the constitution is exactly what SCOTUS engaged in to ignore the plain meaning of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment disqualifying insurrectionists from federal office.

branewave.bsky.social•67 days ago

It’s an under-reading to ignore the weird math contained in the 22nd Amendment that makes a distinction between getting elected to office and serving out someone else’s term. The 22nd makes a distinction; any interpretation that ignores this can’t be the correct reading.

dreyfussaffair.bsky.social•67 days ago

I guess I just don't think the math is weird, per se: the obvious underlying assumption is that one rises from VP to the presidency, and the math is intended to address the subsequent service. To reverse the order in this manner might be textually permissible but is obviously contrary to the intent.

branewave.bsky.social•67 days ago

Yeah the 22A imposes a limit on people who follow the obvious progression from VP to POTUS (or go straight to POTUS). It doesn’t impose other limits, even if everyone agrees it ought to. The Framers really biffed this one.

branewave.bsky.social•67 days ago

There isn’t some textual ambiguity that requires delving into history to resolve; the text is unambiguous and we have to scrounge around in history, looking for a pretext that permits us to ignore the text.

branewave.bsky.social•67 days ago

So like, and this isn’t your obligation, but somebody’s gotta give me an interpretation that engages the actual text in its entirety, and not just hand-waves about what “everyone knows”. Maybe such a reading exists; I just haven’t seen it.

dreyfussaffair.bsky.social•67 days ago

To pretend the political & judicial systems (to the extent they are truly separate) wouldn’t contort themselves in the face of a power grab like this strikes me, after the last quarter-century, as naive.

whstancil.bsky.social•67 days ago

There is no meaningful difference between "I have chosen to ignore the 22nd Amendment because the Constitution don't matter" and "I have chosen to dignify a legalistic reading of the 22nd Amendment which allows Trump to have a third term through a bizarre scheme."

kylerich035.bsky.social•67 days ago

There is no meaningful difference between them, but the SCOTUS prefers the latter and the press seems to treat it as of it is legitimate.

publicuniversal.bsky.social•67 days ago

the press should stop being a Fedsoc stenographer then

kylerich035.bsky.social•67 days ago

I mean yeah that would be ideal.

whstancil.bsky.social•67 days ago

There's no confusion that the Constitution forbids Trump running for president thrice. Allowing lawyers to sift through the Constitution until they can find a way to make 2+2=5 means you've agreed to no longer be bound by the Constitution in any real sense

yorkealbarn.bsky.social•67 days ago

We are already at that point and have been for years. Pretending we aren't doesn't help anything

lines.snail.skin•67 days ago

It seems like it's the 12th Amendment which would make this not work (probably)?

branewave.bsky.social•67 days ago

The 22nd only limits the number of times you can be elected president. It contains no limit on the number of times you can serve out someone else’s term. So there’s still a kind of eligibility even for someone who has been elected twice.

benhosp.bsky.social•67 days ago

That’s already the clear implication of the presidential immunity decision combined with the Colorado 14AS3 decision. The principle that “if the president breaks the law and then wins election, the supposed lawbreaking is thus cured” is now established.

bioturbonick.net•67 days ago

He has already run thrice. You mean hold office thrice.

bioturbonick.net•67 days ago

But that aside, once Trump has taken the oath we will no longer effectively have a Constitution.

graveline.bsky.social•67 days ago

the 14th amendment should have barred him from even running a second time. laws only work when they're enforced.

jovialheist.bsky.social•67 days ago

It does, unfortunately the relevant parties within the nation refused to follow it

jackscellphone.bsky.social•67 days ago

Sure, and everyone knows what the 14th Amendment means, specifically Section 3, yet on January 20th, 2025 no one is going to stop Trump from being inaugurated as President again 👍
https://www.courts.state.co.us/userfiles/file/Court_Probation/Supreme_Court/Opinions/2023/23SA300.pdf

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