By Kolawole Ojebisi
In what appears to be an abuse of legislative privilege, a Republican house member has introduced a bill seeking to allow US President Donald Trump to run for a third term.
Andy Ogles, the representative, initiated the resolution on Thursday. The US Constitution does not permit anyone to be elected to the office of the president more than twice.
Ogles’ resolution seeks to revise this to read: “No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than three times … ”
According to the lawmaker, Trump “has proven himself to be the only figure in modern history capable of reversing our nation’s decay and restoring America to greatness, and he must be given the time necessary to accomplish that goal”.
“It is imperative that we provide President Trump with every resource necessary to correct the disastrous course set by the Biden administration,” Ogles said in a statement.
“He is dedicated to restoring the republic and saving our country, and we, as legislators and as states, must do everything in our power to support him.
“I am proposing an amendment to the Constitution to revise the limitations imposed by the 22nd Amendment on presidential terms.”
Recall that Trump previously dismissed insinuations that he would seek a third term.
However, after winning the 2024 presidential election, he light-heartedly hinted that he would be open to a third term during a chat with Republican lawmakers.
“I suspect I won’t be running again, unless you do something,” Trump had said.
“Unless you say, ‘he’s so good, we have to just figure it out.’”
Ogles praised Trump’s slew of executive orders signed on the first day of his second coming, including the handling of the southern border, restricting gender identities to male and female, energy production, and withdrawing from the World Health Organisation (WHO).
The 22nd Amendment was proposed in 1947 and adopted in 1951. It was ratified to prevent the President Franklin Roosevelt scenario.
Roosevelt ran for the presidency and won four times (1933-1945). He died in 1945, less than 90 days after his fourth inauguration.
Afterwards, Americans welcomed George Washington’s proposition that any president who served more than two terms would likely gravitate to a king or dictator.
Washington is the founding father of the United States and the country’s first president.
Republicans currently hold a three-seat majority in the US house of representatives.
Ogles’ move is reminiscent of the push by certain legislators for the review of Nigeria’s Constitution to allow former president Olusegun Obasanjo run for a third time in office at twilight of his second term in office.
Though Obasanjo has, on several occasions, denied ever being interested in prolonging his stay as Nigeria’s helmsman, many politicans have countered the ex-president’s claim.
However, the move popularly dubbed as “Obasanjo’s Third Term Agenda” did not come to fruition.
