Barack Obama can muse publicly about a hypothetical third term and the corporate media chuckles along, yet those same outlets relentlessly demand that President Donald Trump ritually reaffirm he will vacate the Oval Office on January 20, 2029 something the Constitution already guarantees.
According to Western Journal, the latest iteration of this media fixation came during an interview with NBC Nightly News anchor Tom Llamas, who dutifully reprised the now-standard question about whether Trump would ever attempt to overstay his constitutional welcome. Trumps answer, delivered with the timing of a seasoned performer, cut straight to the absurdity of the exercise: Wouldnt the press hate it if they no longer had this narrative to speculate about?
The conversation, published Wednesday, was ostensibly a broad discussion of serious issues affordability, immigration, and the ongoing challenges in Minneapolis all topics that actually affect Americans daily lives. Yet, predictably, the interview could not proceed without the obligatory nod to the lefts favorite doomsday scenario about Trump and democracy.
But, of course, we had to have this: On Jan. 21, 2029, do you see any scenario where you are still president? Llamas asked.
The question was not born of genuine constitutional concern; it was driven by a narrative that has been carefully cultivated since 2020, when Trump like millions of Americans questioned the integrity of that years election.
The lefts storyline is simple and hysterical: because Trump challenged the 2020 results, he is forever a Threat To Democracy who must be monitored for any sign that he might defy the 22nd Amendment. Yet if he were truly the aspiring autocrat his critics claim, logic dictates he would have found a way to remain in office on Jan. 21, 2021, rather than presiding over the peaceful transfer of power to Joe Biden.
He did not then, and there was an orderly inauguration for Biden, despite the medias fevered rhetoric. By the same constitutional logic, he will not be president on Jan. 21, 2029, either, because he cannot be and everyone in Washington knows it.
Trump, recognizing the theater for what it was, chose to treat the moment as entertainment rather than dignify the premise.
I dont know, he said, followed by a smile: It would be interesting.
He then twisted the knife with a bit of showmans flair: But wouldnt it be terrible if I agreed with if I gave you the answer that youre looking for? he continued. It would make life so much less exciting, right? It would be so much less exciting. In that brief exchange, Trump exposed the medias game: they are less interested in constitutional clarity than in keeping alive a narrative that fuels ratings and reinforces progressive fears.
Then he pivoted back to his core message, reminding viewers why he says he is in the arena at all. But I only do this for one reason: make America great again. And thats what we are doing. We are making America great again greater than ever before.
Everyone understands the reality: Trump will leave office on Jan. 20, 2029, if he wins in November, and there is no serious constitutional debate about that. Llamas goal was not to clarify the law but to coax Trump into a soundbite that could be framed as either a reluctant concession or a sinister hint, giving NBC its preferred smug moment on air.
Even NBC News, in its own write-up, had to acknowledge that Trump was toying with them rather than plotting a coup. Llamas also pressed Trump who has occasionally suggested an interest in serving an unconstitutional third term about whether he sees any scenario in which hes still president on Jan. 21, 2029 the day after a successor would be sworn into office. Trumps response indicated that he enjoys stirring drama around the subject.
That grudging admission is still more honest than the silence that greeted Obamas own third-term joke on Stephen Colberts show back in November 2020. When Obama mused about effectively running a meat puppet President from behind the scenes while lounging in sweats, the media treated it as clever late-night banter, not a constitutional crisis.
The irony is sharper in hindsight, given that Democrats soon rallied behind a visibly diminished Joe Biden an actual barely sentient meat puppet who happened to be Barack Obamas vice president as their standard-bearer. Yet no one in the press corps pressed Obama about whether he was the one figuratively typing into Bidens teleprompter or orchestrating an unconstitutional third term by proxy.
Nobody ever pressed Obama about whether he was the guy typing into Bidens teleprompter during those years, did they? Nobody ever questioned whether there was some kind of unconstitutional third-term arrangement going on.
The reason is obvious: there was no such arrangement, and the notion would have been dismissed as a Hollywood plot device rather than a serious allegation precisely how Trumps supposed third-term ambitions ought to be treated.
Thats because (duh) there wasnt. This would make a great high-concept movie and a lousy way to run the White House. (Plus, knowing Biden rather intimately, do you really think Barack labored under the misapprehension Scranton Joe could pull it off? He wasnt even capable when he didnt have dementia.) The double standard is not about law or precedent; it is about which party the media wants to shield and which it wants to portray as a permanent danger to the republic.
What remains, then, is a media obsession that sheds no light and offers no benefit to the public, but reliably feeds partisan anxieties.
Therell be a new president on Jan. 21, 2029. It wont be Donald Trump in a costume mustache going by the name Il Donaldo de Trumpia. Next?
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