Donald Trump has claimed he could serve a third term as president despite it going against the US constitution. In an interview he said there were ways around the rules and that his supporters wanted him to stay on. But, asks Alex Hannaford, how seriously should we take him and what would it mean for the future of America?
The Constitution leaves what happens if the Presidency and VP are both vacant at the same time up to Congress, and Congress has passed various Presidential Succession Acts, the most recent being 1947. The language in that Act specifically exempts anyone who would otherwise be ineligible from becoming President.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidential_Succession_Act
And this has been enforced in the past; Cabinet Secretaries who were not natural-born citizens have not been included in the succession list. I remember specifically that when Madeline Albright was Clinton’s Secretary of State, she was not on the list because she was born in Prague.