Already and this is the daily This is the Daily ohs oh, now it makes sense.
Good morning and welcome to the Daily OS. It's Wednesday, the twenty ninth of October. I'm Emma Gillespie.
I'm beliefit Simon's.
US President Donald Trump has once again refused to rule out running for a third term, telling reporters.
This week he would love to do it.
US presidents are restricted to a two term limit.
But could Trump change that?
Today we are going to break down what the US Constitution says about presidential terms, the likelihood of anything changing, and take a look at how Australia's system compares.
Emma, this is a conversation that I feel like has come up a few times in relation to Trump. But do you want to walk us through why we are talking bout it today? What has happened this week?
Yes? So.
US President Donald Trump was speaking to reporters on his plane Air Force one, on Monday. He was on his way to Japan and reporters on board asked him about the possibility of running for a third term, so that would be in twenty twenty eight.
Here is what he said, I would love to do it. I have my best snubbers. Ever, it's very terrible. I have my best snubb receipt.
You read it. Am I not.
Ruling it out. You'll have to tell me.
All I can tell you is that we have a great group of people which stay dout bye.
They He's talking about the Democrats, and that great group he described includes Vice President j. D. Vance and the current Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
And this isn't the first time that Trump has floated this idea, right.
Not at all. In fact, far from the first time. Trump has actually repeatedly teased this idea of a third term, even since before he won a second presidential term. So in twenty eighteen, that was during his first term as president, he commended Chinese President Jijinping for being a quote president for life, adding that maybe we'll give that a shot someday. So this goes all the way back to then. At a twenty nineteen rally, Trump told students chanting four more
years that they should be saying sixteen more years. And more recently, he told NBC in April that there are methods that could allow him to serve again, but he didn't elaborate any further on what that would look like he has an online merch site where you can buy Trump twenty twenty eight hats and T shirts right now.
Really, that's your prerogative. I don't know that.
So you can buy Trump twenty twenty eight hats right now.
Yep, right now, if you go online to his store and you want to do that. I'm not sure what the shipping to Australia is like. And finally, Trump's former White House chief strategist, a guy called Steve Bannon, who you may remember, he said on a podcast this week that quote, Trump is going to be president in twenty eight and people ought to just get accommodated with that. At the appropriate time, will lay out what the plan is. But there is a plan, he said.
Wow, And I think we should explain why it's not currently possible for Trump actually to run for a third term, and also acknowledge that it's different here in Australia. You can be Prime minister for however long you want, or however long the public wants you to be the leader of the country. Yes, but in the US it's actually not legally possible.
Right now, yeap.
And that is per the US Constitution, which is very clear on this there is an amendment in that Constitution, the twenty second Amendment, which states, and I quote, no person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice. This is an amendment that was formalized in nineteen fifty one, and that was a few years after President F. D. Roosevelt won an unprecedented third term in nineteen forty followed by a fourth term in nineteen
five forty four. But before that, presidents had traditionally served two terms, and the twenty second Amendment formalized that. It enshrined that tradition into law. Just a quick note on the Constitution and its importance or the reason it's so significant in this case. It's basically the supreme law of
the Land of America. That's how it's described. So this is a document that acts as the fundamental framework for the US government the legal system, and also sets out the guaranteed basic rights and freedoms of the American people.
We'll be right back with more on today's deep dive, but first, here is a quick message from today's sponsor. So, the Constitution explicitly forbids third term presidencies, but are there any potential loopholes?
This has been the subject of a lot of scrutiny and discussion in recent months, and there has been some conversation about the exact wording. So the amendment says no person shall be elected to the office more than twice, but some legal scholars are asking whether there's a distinction between being elected to the presidency and serving as president. So I'll explain this through a theoretical scenario. And this
has been floated by some in the US. It's about whether a two term president could actually become president for a third term through the office of the vice president. So, for example, if Trump ran for vice president in twenty twenty eight, which legally he could, and he was elected and he was serving with someone like JD. Vance or Marco Rubio, if something happened to the president, Trump as VP would then take over. That is how that role functions,
or if the president resigned on day one. So that's a possible way that it could all play out. Trump had previously said he was openly considering that option, but when asked about it this week, he did rule that plan out.
He called it quote too cute of an idea.
And I guess the obvious question is can the Constitution change. Although if the US Constitution is anything like the Australian Constitution, I imagine that is a very difficult process.
Yes, it is a difficult process.
It's difficult in different ways in the US Wich I'll explain, But that is the only legitimate path for Trump to secure a third term, and it would be extremely difficult because amending the Constitution in the US requires support from two thirds of the House of Representatives the lower house, and two thirds of the Senate the upper house.
So basically you need more than.
A majority of politicians in both houses to support a prospective amendment, which is incredibly rare. How rare it is only twenty seven amendments have been added to the US Constitution since it was written in seventeen eighty seven. That's over more than two hundred and thirty years. Twenty seven amendments.
Wow. So it is different to how it works in Australia because in Australia you need the public's approval, but here you need Congress's approval. And just to explain a little bit further, Republicans don't currently have two thirds control of the House or the Senate, which is why that wouldn't be a likely option.
Exactly, and that's a kind of I suppose democratic protection in the Constitution that it's not just about the government of the day making a decision, but a significant majority of elected officials contributing to that decision.
And so realistically, is there enough momentum around this idea for it to happen? I imagine not.
Not really at this stage.
But that doesn't mean that there aren't attempts happening within Congress to secure an amendment to change this. So earlier this year, a Republican Congressman by the name of Andy Ogles introduced a resolution that would alter the twenty second Amendment to allow presidents who serve two non consecutive terms to run again. So under that plan, hypothetically Try could complete this second term, he would be ruled out of the next election, but would be eligible in the one
after that. But a few weeks after Ogles introduced that resolution, we saw basically a counter resolution introduced by a Democratic congressman by the name of Daniel Goldman. He introduced a resolution to reaffirm the House of Representative support for the twenty second Amendment and reaffirm that it quote prohibits President Trump from running for president for another term, Goldman said in a statement, the twenty second Amendment enshrines a fundamental
principle of our democracy. No president can serve for more than two terms. So there is at the moment significant political division going by just what these two opposing politicians are doing and saying.
And the issue is highly unlikely.
To move in the coming months or years ahead of that twenty twenty eight election.
But it is interesting that it is active conversation happening right now.
Very much so.
And the more that Donald Trump makes comments like he did this week saying he would love to run again, you know, things happen in US politics that we never expected to happen all the time.
Yeah, and I've mentioned a few times how it is here in Australia compared to how it is in the US. Do you want to explain that a little bit more about how terms work here in Australia.
Yeah. Absolutely, So our system is completely different. We don't have term limits on individual leadership roles at all, because in fact, we don't have the presidential system, so there's no limit how long someone can serve as prime minister.
The prime minister isn't directly elected by voters. As we know, you know, they are the leader of the party that wins the most support, so you know, the leader of Labor or the leader of the coalition who win the majority of seats in the House of Reps, that is who becomes the Prime minister. But you know, as we have seen, our government terms don't dictate our prime minister terms. But as long as a leader of a party in government maintains support, they can stay in that job indefinitely.
Our longest serving PM was Robert Menzies who served for eighteen years.
That is a long time.
Yeah, it is a very long time, especially by today's measure. And John Howard served for eleven years. So really there's nothing from stopping that from happening. Again, it's just unusual that we see that kind of tenure in our two major parties when it comes to individual leaders.
One thing that is also different with Australia system is that our terms for leaders for prime ministers is three years as opposed to four years in the US. But I know there's been a conversation about potentially changing that.
Yes, so our terms are three years, but that's how long a government governs for, not necessarily how long a prime minister.
Leads for yes.
So both Prime Minister Anthony Albanesi and senior coalition officials have previously rest support for changing to four year terms. The argument here is that three years is too short of a window for governments to really set out long term policy and to really enact those long term policies. So, you know, a changing constant election cycle, politicians spend a
year organizing, a year implementing policy, a year campaigning. The eye is always on the next polling day rather than you know, the shift in legislation and governing.
And if that was to change, what would that process look like for how to change it?
So here, a change like that would require a referendum, and as we know, to succeed a proposal needs a majority of support in a majority of states. That old chestnut that has proven to be very difficult in Australian history, as we know. But I actually didn't know this until today. In nineteen eighty eight, Prime Minister Bob Hawk put a proposal to change to four year terms. Who a referendum, Surprise, surprise, it failed.
I was gonna say, how'd that go?
It actually performed really badly. Some of the lowest yes votes in Australia's referendum history. This proposal received overall a thirty three percent national yes vote, but it did not achieve a majority in any state.
I wonder why why were people so opposed to it.
I don't know.
I think now that we have the example of four year terms in the US, it's maybe changed the way we think. And I guess because we've had a lot of fluctuation in our politics domestically for the last twenty odd years. But a recent news poll conducted for The Australian shows there is about fifty one percent support here in Australia for four year terms. I wouldn't call that overwhelming public enthusiasm. And there's also a bit of a
headache that this could cause in the Senate. So Upper House terms are currently double the length of Lower House terms. Foreign Minister Pennyonong has argued eight year terms are too long, so there is a fair bit to it that, you know, maybe we just can't be bothered to.
Deal with it fair enough.
That would be.
Two very different systems with very different debates going on. Thank you for breaking that down, Emma, Thanks Billy. That's all for today's deep dive. We'll be back this afternoon with the headlines. Until then, have a great day. My name is Lily Maddon and I'm a proud Arunda Bungelung Caalcuttin woman from Gadigol Country. The Daily oz acknowledges that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Island and nations. We pay our respects to the first peoples of these countries, both past and present.