So, there's two things about that. 1) a lot of the talk about precedent set by Lincoln doing stuff that was clearly extra-consititutional if not totally unconstitutional, and the 'extraordinary powers' of the president in times of war, leads me to believe that Trump could've simply extended his term. I'll admit that it's pretty arbitrary, kind of "ok, laws are suspended and we'll do what's necessary," not to mention poor optics, but I still think it's a possibility.
- The constitution allowed congress to regulate succession, and congressional acts have provided for the line of succession to go to the cabinet members, with the first one in line being the Secretary of State. With the current congress being illegitimate (ruling out both Pelosi and Leahy from the line of succession), and the terms of Trump and Pence ending, that would leave Pompeo as US President. The cabinet officers don't have a legally defined end-of-term date like the president, as they typically hand in a resignation letter to the incoming president, so they stay in office even while administrations change, and before new cabinet members get senate approval. (Yes, he's moonlighting as a Fox commentator, but there's no law against that.) I tried to find a resignation letter from Pompeo and couldn't find it, and he also had a weird tweet about "transitioning to a new role" near the end of the Trump admin. I've always liked this theory.
Disclaimer: I haven't gone too deep into this, so it's entirely possible that he resigned after I stopped looking (but maybe after becoming president!), and maybe there is a law I didn't see that ends the term of cabinet officers by statute. If other people want to dig, please do so. But I like this theory, and have always trusted Kansas.
So, there's two things about that. 1) a lot of the talk about precedence set by Lincoln doing stuff that was clearly extra-consititutional if not totally unconstitutional, and the 'extraordinary powers' of the president in times of war, leads me to believe that he could've simply extended his term. I'll admit that it's pretty arbitrary, kind of "ok, laws are suspended and we'll do what's necessary," but I still think it's a possibility.
- The constitution allowed congress to regulate succession, and congressional acts have provided for the line of succession to go to the cabinet members, with the first one in line being the Secretary of State. With the current congress being illegitimate (ruling out both Pelosi and Leahy from the line of succession), that would leave Pompeo as US President. The cabinet officers don't have a legally defined end-of-term date like the president, and they typically hand in a resignation letter to the incoming president, so they stay in office even while administrations change. Yes, he's moonlighting as a Fox commentator, but there's no law against that. I tried to find a resignation letter from Pompeo and couldn't find it, and he also had a weird tweet about "transitioning to a new role" near the end of the Trump admin. I've always liked this theory.
Disclaimer: I haven't gone too deep into this, so it's entirely possible that he resigned after I stopped looking (but maybe after becoming president!), and maybe there is a law I didn't see that ends the term of cabinet officers by statute. If other people want to dig, please do so. But I like this theory, and have always trusted Kansas.