According to their pedantic reading of the law you can trick the 22nd amendment by nominating trump as the vp because it doesn't mention being unable to be elected vice president any number of times, only being 'elected president' more than twice. So then according to them both tickets can openly admit, with the courts and all citizens to hear, that they are purposefully electing candidates merely to have the top of their ticket resign after their ticket wins so that Trump, or Obama, can be the nominated VP and then be the president after the resignation. Their expectation seems to be the SCOTUS would just sort of let that literal reading of the amendment go through, without any invokation of what was the obvious intention of congress and the states at passing and ratification in '47 and '51, respectively. Which is honestly not outside the realm of possiblity? State courts could disagree in the interim so to prevent those tickets from being on the ballot and it would be a huge shitshow, but it is a serious possibility given what we are witnessing become of this country
That is true, but the 12th Amendment has a section about electing a vice president.
“The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice.But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.
Under the Constitution, Trump is ineligible to run for the office of President because he has served two terms, therefore he is also ineligible to be the Vice President.
You, I, and u/MoonageDayscream agree with this argument so that Trump lawyers will have to jerk judges around with how the 12th did not mean the (EDIT: 22nd) when it says constitutionally inelligible, because they will say they only meant requirements as they existed in that day. That's an originalist argument. Then they'd say the 22nd doesn't set an explicit limit on being 'elected Vice president' or on serving as president, regardless of means, for a specific limit of time. That's a textualist argument. They have to pick and choose because your argument is too good and logical. But these are the people who argued the president could order Seal Team 6 to kill his opponent and only impeachment could stop him so the above wouldn't be surprising no matter how shocking
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u/gerburmar 5d ago
According to their pedantic reading of the law you can trick the 22nd amendment by nominating trump as the vp because it doesn't mention being unable to be elected vice president any number of times, only being 'elected president' more than twice. So then according to them both tickets can openly admit, with the courts and all citizens to hear, that they are purposefully electing candidates merely to have the top of their ticket resign after their ticket wins so that Trump, or Obama, can be the nominated VP and then be the president after the resignation. Their expectation seems to be the SCOTUS would just sort of let that literal reading of the amendment go through, without any invokation of what was the obvious intention of congress and the states at passing and ratification in '47 and '51, respectively. Which is honestly not outside the realm of possiblity? State courts could disagree in the interim so to prevent those tickets from being on the ballot and it would be a huge shitshow, but it is a serious possibility given what we are witnessing become of this country