Plurality Of Voters Feel More Patriotic Because Of Trump’s Presidency, Survey Says
'patriotic Americans'
Congress Needs To Grill Joe Biden About Whether He Was Actually President
The American people have a right to know who was actually in charge of the executive branch, with all its awesome power, for four years.Trump says he's serious about another term in office: 'Sort of a fourth term'
President Donald Trump said in a Sunday morning phone interview that he is serious about the possibility of serving a third term in office. When pressed later aboard Air Force One about his comments, the 78-year-old Republican suggested that supporters have raised the possibility of him ultimately serving a total of 12 years, citing their pleasure with the wins he has notched since retaking office.
"A lot of people want me to do it," Trump told NBC News' Kristen Welker. "But, I mean, I basically tell them we have a long way to go, you know, it's very early in the administration."
"I'm focused on the current," added Trump.
Article II, Section 1, of the Constitution set presidential terms at four years but did not originally set term limits. While presidents were long able to serve over two terms, George Washington set a precedent that all but one president, Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt, followed.
In response to Roosevelt holding onto power from 1933 until 1945, the 22nd Amendment was ratified in 1951, limiting presidents to serving two terms.
The Congressional Research Service indicated that over the past seven decades, there have been scores of attempts to repeal the two-term limit as well as chatter among partisans about their favored president serving some overtime.
Just as there was some interest in the possibility of a third term for Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1960, there was a push in 1973 by Richard Nixon supporters — pleased with the Republican's successful first term — to eliminate the constitutional obstacle to another four years. Apparently, there was also serious interest among supporters of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama to ax the 22nd Amendment in the interest of keeping their favorites politically viable for more time in the Oval Office.
There has also been interest in clearing the way for a third Trump term.
Tennessee Rep. Andy Ogles (R) introduced a House joint resolution in January that would enable a president to serve three terms so long as he did not already serve two consecutive terms. Accordingly, Trump could serve a third term but Obama and Clinton would be unable.
'We have a long time to go.'
"[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," Ogles said in a statement. "To that end, I am proposing an amendment to the Constitution to revise the limitations imposed by the 22nd Amendment on presidential terms."
It is highly unlikely such a constitutional amendment would receive the required two-thirds vote in both houses of Congress as well as the required ratification of three-fourths of the state legislatures or state conventions.
"There are methods which you could do it," Trump told Welker when asked about whether he had seen plans detailing how he might pursue another term.
NBC News reportedly floated a possible scenario where Vice President JD Vance successfully won a presidential election then substituted Trump in. After all, the Constitution specifically prohibits reelection to a third term but does not explicitly prohibit a third term.
Legal scholars indicated in a Clinton-era paper published by the Minnesota Law Review that "a President nearing the end of his or her second term and determined to stay in office might run as Vice President with the idea that the President-elect would step aside, allowing the already twice-elected President (and Vice President-elect) to serve a third term without running afoul of the Twenty-Second Amendment's bar on reelection."
While "there would be inevitable conflict over its legality and wisdom," the paper noted that "the possibility of an already twice-elected President reassuming that Office also presents opportunities of potential benefit to the polity."
Trump, who would be nearing the age of 87 by the end of a third term, told NBC News the vice-presidential backdoor into a third term is one possibility, adding that "there are others too," without elaboration.
'I'm not joking.'
When asked about whether he would actually want another term, Trump told Welker, "I like working."
"I'm not joking," added Trump. "But I'm not — it is far too early to think about it."
When asked later in the day about his interest in a third term, Trump told reporters, "I'm not looking at that, but I'll tell you, I have had more people ask me to have a third term, which is, in a way, a fourth term because the other election, the 2020 election, was totally rigged. So it's actually sort of a fourth term in a certain way. I just don't want the credit for the second because Biden was so bad."
After claiming "some very important people" have complimented his second administration's accomplishments, Trump noted he doesn't want to talk about the possibility because "no matter how you look at it, we have a long time to go."
It is unclear if Trump is just trying to rile up his critics. While he has previously expressed interest in a third term, he told Time magazine last year he was not interested in repealing the 22nd Amendment and told House Republicans in November, "I suspect I won't be running again unless you say, 'He's so good we've got to figure something else out.'"
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Obama's former right-hand man Rahm Emanuel posturing for presidential run: Report
The list of potential Democratic presidential candidates for 2028 continues to grow.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom appears to have aspirations of podcasting his way from his crime-ridden state to the White House. Newsom's fellow governor Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania is also considered a contender — at least by the Washington Post. Among the numerous other middling prospects keen to throw their hats in the ring is Minnesota's honesty-impaired governor, Tim Walz, who recently indicated that he would run "if the circumstances are right."
Barack Obama's old right-hand man Rahm Emanuel — the Democrat who famously said at the outset of the 2008 financial crisis that "you never want a serious crisis to go to waste" — is apparently now also preparing to run, ready to exploit the crisis in the Democratic Party to distinguish himself from the pack.
Emanuel is a Democratic operative who fundraised for Bill Clinton ahead of the 1992 presidential election, then later served as his adviser, championing NAFTA; represented Illinois for three terms in the House; served as Obama's chief of staff from 2009 to 2010; and served as Biden's ambassador to Japan.
Between his stints with the Obama and Biden administrations, Emanuel served as mayor of Chicago for eight years, during which time he oversaw an explosion in the city's crime and rat infestation rates; secretly used a personal email domain for government work; dropped the ball on affordable housing promises; and saw 60% of his top 103 campaign donors receive city contracts, zoning changes, pension work, business permits, regulatory help, or other consequential benefits, according to a Chicago Tribune analysis.
Emanuel recently told Politico, "I'm not done with public service, and I'm hoping public service is not done with me."
The liberal publication previously propped up by federal subscriptions indicated that Emanuel's behavior since returning home from Japan hints at ambitions of pursuing higher office. He has sought to maximize his visibility, appearing on podcasts, securing a CNN contract, and consistently spilling ink in his Washington Post column.
'He understands how to win.'
Emanuel has also made his rounds on the lecture circuit, addressing deep-pocketed audiences at the Chicago Economic Club and at the Realtors Political Action Committee President's Circle conference last month. He is apparently set to speak at West Point as part of a broader service academy tour, which will allow him to test the waters with other voter demographics.
Politico suggested that Emanuel's recent efforts to play to opinion polls is further evidence that he is testing the waters. He has embraced popular Republican positions on gender ideology and the need to remedy bureaucratic bloat in the federal government, while criticizing the Democratic Party's leftist fetishes, which helped Kamala Harris lose in November and alienated American voters.
It appears that elements of the Democratic establishment are receptive to the idea of Emanuel as a candidate.
"Who has more relevant experience?" former Obama adviser David Axelrod told Politico. "He understands how to win and speaks bluntly in an idiom that most folks understand."
Axelrod apparently characterized Emanuel as the "remedy, not the replica, of a president with little interest in governance and the chaos that flows from that," according to a paraphrase from Politico.
While Politico appears convinced that Emanuel might try for the top seat, it appears that the 65-year-old Democrat is open to securing power at virtually any level. The Chicago Tribune reported that Emanuel has not ruled out running again for Chicago mayor or seeking the Democratic nomination for Illinois governor next year if Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) does not run again.
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'Autopen' used on official docs throughout Biden presidency — including on pardons while he vacationed: Report
The Heritage Foundation's Oversight Project revealed Thursday that Joe Biden's signature on numerous executive orders, pardons, and other documents of national consequence appears to have been machine-generated.
Oversight Project Executive Director Mike Howell told Blaze News, "The main legal question here is who was the president over the last four years. That's what we are aiming to uncover. The prolific use of autopen by the Biden White House was an instrument to hide the truth from the American people as to who was running the government."
The watchdog group noted that "every document" they could find with Biden's signature — with the exception of the announcement indicating that he was dropping out of the 2024 presidential race — "used the same autopen signature."
The Oversight Project noted, for instance, that the repeatedly used autopen signature appeared on the pardons for a murderer and five other criminals that were issued while Biden was vacationing and golfing in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The pardons all reportedly indicated that they were signed "at the City of Washington."
This discovery, coupled with the former president's alleged admission to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) that he did not remember signing a January 2024 order to pause decisions on exports of liquefied natural gas, prompted the Oversight Project to once again cast doubt on whether Biden was ever calling the shots and to suggest that "WHOEVER CONTROLLED THE AUTOPEN CONTROLLED THE PRESIDENCY."
Critics, enraged by yet another indication that unelected ideologues may have secretly controlled the executive branch for the past four years, are now questioning the legitimacy of the documents bearing the autopen signature.
'All those orders are void.'
Seeking definitive answers, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey wrote to the Department of Justice last week requesting a full investigation into the legality of Biden's presidential actions in light of his apparent mental decline, which was especially clear to special counsel Robert Hur, who figured Biden as possibly too senile to charge.
"Under the 25th Amendment, his inability to make decisions should have meant a succession of power," Bailey noted in his letter. "Instead, it appears staffers and officers in the Biden administration may have exploited Biden's incapacity so they could issue orders without an accountable President of sound mind approving them."
President Donald Trump told Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck in October that Joe Biden was likely little more than a figurehead for a "committee" of unnamed bureaucrats.
Lindy Li, a former Democratic strategist and fundraiser who served as a surrogate for failed presidential candidate Kamala Harris and worked for the 2020 Biden campaign, recently shed some light on potential members of that supposed committee. Li told podcaster Shawn Ryan last month that Hunter Biden, Jill Biden, and a handful of other unelected senior advisers effectively served as a combined shadow president.
Missouri Attorney General Bailey suggested that a number of pardons Biden supposedly signed were suspicious, including the unconditional 10-year pardon Biden supposedly gave his son after repeatedly vowing he would not do so and just months after declaring without qualification, "No one is above the law."
"It is black-letter law that a document is void, ab initio, when the person signing it lacks mental capacity," wrote Bailey. "Staffers and the Vice President cannot constitutionally evade accountability by laundering far-left orders through a man who does not know what he is signing. If in fact this has been occurring, then all those orders are void."
The Oversight Project suggested that in order to determine whether Biden ordered the signing of key documents or was even mentally capable of doing so, investigators must "determine who controlled the autopen and what checks there were in place."
The watchdog group further indicated that Biden's work to undermine the White House executive privilege shield will make such determinations achievable.
"There is a constitutional process to deal with an incapacitated POTUS and it doesn't contemplate giving someone else his autopen and authority," tweeted Howell. "It's called the 25th Amendment and the conspiracy not to invoke it in order to keep whatever they were doing going is a big problem."
The New York Post indicated that representatives for Biden had not responded to requests for comment regarding the use of the autopen.
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Was Lincoln gay? New doc conscripts American icon to LGBT cause
Abraham Lincoln holds a mythic position in the American consciousness. He’s respected across the political spectrum. He redrew America’s social contract and self-image. And because he led the country through the Civil War and abolition, he’s now accorded a status befitting a Greek god, cast in bronze and marble.
Lincoln is essential to the American social contract, which makes him essential to any political cause seeking to reframe the national project. He’s criticized by “woke” leftists and alt-righters as a symbol of the neo-liberal consensus and used as a symbol of equality and unity by those in power.
One of the saddest things about the modern world is that the concept of close male friendship has functionally been destroyed.
It’s no surprise, then, that the LGBT movement would come to claim him as well. While no American presidents have ever been openly "gay" as such, a handful have attracted questions concerning their sexual proclivities. Lincoln’s predecessor James Buchanan, for example, was America’s only bachelor president, a pink flag for certain historians looking to "out" him.
Lincoln's outsized stature naturally makes him a far more tempting catch. As transgender and gay issues increasingly dominate the discourse, there have been more than a few attempts to use speculation about Lincoln’s private life and vague comments in his letters to canonize our 16th president as an official "queer" icon.
A deliberate provocation
A recent documentary boldly announces its intention in its blunt title: "Lover of Men: The Untold Story of Abraham Lincoln."
The film was released this fall to general praise from the press and backlash from conservative media. The filmmakers mostly laughed off said backlash, telling the Hollywood Reporter that they were “thrilled” that Ben Shapiro, Alex Jones, and Elon Musk were furious about it. “The reason that they notice the film is because it is compelling. This story is provocative,” said director Shaun Peterson.
The case "Lover of Men" makes goes roughly like this: Lincoln had very close relationships with multiple men throughout his adult life, relationships that were arguably more intimate than traditional friendships. He shared beds with men for months or years at a time, revealed details of his sex life to them in letters, and openly expressed his deep emotional connection to them.
The film essentially argues that Lincoln was LGBT avant la lettre, living an identity that would today be recognized as "queer," "fluid," or "non-conforming." Whether Lincoln actually had sex with any of these men is largely immaterial.
Strange bedfellows
"Lover of Men" dismisses most of the immediate rebuttals with a shrug; the first among them being that beds in the 19th century were expensive and scarce, and it wasn’t uncommon for inns to assign multiple men to a bed or for male friends to share beds.
Peterson's argument relies upon the common modern assumption that intimacy and sexuality are deeply entwined things. The possibility that two men would share deep affection without any hint of the erotic is mostly overlooked because the alternative soundbite — Lincoln was gay! — proves irresistible.
Ironically, Peterson's eagerness to reach this conclusion tells us more about the America of today than it does about Lincoln's era. One of the saddest things about the modern world is that the concept of close male friendship has functionally been destroyed. Even progressive feminists will admit that one of the privileges women enjoy is the ability to form intimate, non-sexual relationships without any hint of Eros.
Men consequently tend to be lonelier than women and have more trouble intimately bonding.
Part of this can be attributed to a decline in fraternal organizations, with most male-only organizations now admitting women. Part of it is also the growing masculine insecurity with being perceived as unmasculine.
The erosion of male friendship
Still, the pernicious influence of the LGBT lobby's tendency to cast public male intimacy as gay should not be underestimated. One needs only recall the particularly fanciful attempts to affirm the secret, sexual passion between "Lord of the Rings" protagonists Frodo and Sam, despite all evidence to the contrary, not least of which is author J.R.R. Tolkien's devout Catholicism.
The result is a negative feedback loop. Men have fewer and fewer opportunities to express themselves. They are criticized for not being emotional; at the same time, any emotional expression is seized upon as evidence of homosexuality.
Tolkien's close friend C.S. Lewis, himself a target of LGBT revisionists, diagnosed the problem more than 60 years ago in his book "The Four Loves": “Those who cannot conceive Friendship as a substantive love but only as a disguise or elaboration of Eros betray the fact that they have never had a Friend. The rest of us know that though we can have erotic love and friendship for the same person yet in some ways nothing is less like a Friendship than a love affair.”
Was Lincoln "closeted"? It's certainly possible — but it seems likely that the claim is beyond proving. "Lover of Men" takes this as reason enough to indulge its speculation. As one interviewee argues, “If the naysayers had their way, there wouldn’t be a gay history because you couldn’t prove it.”
And yet "Lover of Men" is not content to settle for the past. Appropriating Lincoln’s life as a story of repressed homosexuality is a means to entrenching the LGBT movement's power in the present; one commentator goes so far as to say the 14th Amendment should be extended to Americans identifying as transgender.
Whatever one's personal opinions on the matter, using Lincoln as a vehicle for modern-day activism in this way is bad history. We don’t know the secrets of Lincoln’s cloistered heart, and neither do the historians Peterson has assembled. We should be happy to admit our ignorance; some things are meant to remain a mystery.
There Is Nothing ‘Joyful’ About Harris’ and Walz’s Grimly Anti-American Agenda
The Harris-Walz campaign's ambivalent message on public policy is designed to hide their destruction of everything they govern.The Ousting Of Biden Was A Textbook Coup D’état
This type of coup was supposed to have been rendered impossible back when our grandfathers were in middle age. Now we know better.If Republians win, then what? Conservatives Chip Roy, Daniel Horowitz, Steve Deace, and Allen West talk post-2024 politics
Former President Donald Trump is aiming to triumphantly return to the White House, and Republicans are seeking to take the Senate and expand their House majority, but what should Republicans' top priorities be next year if they manage to gain more power?
Blaze News reached out to conservative figures including GOP Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, former Rep. Allen West, and Blaze Media's own Daniel Horowitz and Steve Deace to get their thoughts.
'Before we even delve into the deep state, there's the shallow state that' must 'be tackled.'
"Republicans always make excuses for the power they currently have by tantalizing voters with promises of having greater power later on," Horowitz told Blaze News. "If you believe in judicial supremacism to strike down every single policy, and if you believe you can never have a government shutdown, then really nothing will ever change."
Horowitz said that Republicans must be willing to leverage appropriations bills as well as "critical program reauthorization bills" in order to "force through reforms on popular issues."
He mentioned seizing upon issues where a "supermajority of voters agree with you," like "shutting down the border," and then applying leverage to stand steadfastly on the matter.
He called for tackling "inflation, invasion, and indoctrination," saying that Trump should wield his power "to immediately suspend almost all forms of immigration" so that "nobody is allowed in" and people are "sent back if they come to the border without a visa." He also mentioned suspending "all new categories of green cards" as well as visas.
The conservative commentator said that Trump should fire all civil service members in roles that have an impact on policy and should head into office with a battery of people who can fill those roles.
"Before we even delve into the deep state, there's the shallow state that" must "be tackled," he noted, saying that just a "small percentage of Trump's top department and agency picks reflected the values of his supporters during the first term. That needs to change."
"We need to see more Russ Voughts and fewer Steven Mnuchins," Horowitz said.
Vought served as director of the Office of Management and Budget during a portion of Trump's White House tenure, while Mnuchin served as treasury secretary under the 45th president.
Horowitz, who said that there must be a "reckoning on COVID," called for the "full suspension" of COVID-19 vaccines.
Roy told Blaze News that he believes Republicans will secure a "trifecta," winning control of the White House and both congressional chambers.
'Dismantling the regulatory state'
The congressman pointed to tackling the border crisis and the "regulatory state" as the "two most important" areas for Trump to address.
Roy said that Trump would have the power to "massively clamp down" on the border flow simply by "enforcing current law," though he added that fully addressing it would also require action by Congress.
The conservative lawmaker called for "massively checking spending ... while dismantling the regulatory state."
Other objectives he mentioned included achieving "health care freedom" and a tax policy that is pro-growth.
Retired Army Lt. Col. Allen West told Blaze News, "The first and pre-eminent mission for President Trump as the 47th president is to restore constitutional governance to our republic."
"That means we must restore the principles of the U.S. Constitution, which is a restraining document on the powers of the federal government. That means we must rein in out-of-control spending, establish zero based budgeting processes. He must reverse the abject lawlessness and disdain for the rule of law that has been the raison d'etre of the Biden administration," West explained.
'And we have to end the scourge of 21st-century human and sex trafficking of children.'
West has previously served in the U.S. House of Representatives as a lawmaker from Florida and has also previously served as the chair of the Republican Party of Texas. He is the executive director of the American Constitutional Rights Union. Earlier this year he won a race for Dallas County Republican Party chair.
"Our borders must again be secured and the millions of illegal single military-age males and females must be deported. And we have to end the scourge of 21st-century human and sex trafficking of children. We must regain our energy independence and withdraw from the foolishness of the so-called Green New Deal, which has brought us the insidious rates of inflation. Lastly, we have to regain our stance of a global leader, re-emphasize our military strength, ending this lurch towards leftist ideological engineering," he continued.
In the event of another Trump term, Deace told Blaze News that he is concerned about the issue of "vision."
"My biggest concern for a second Trump presidency would be the vision, more so than the issues. The vision should be that which restores the most autonomy back to the American people, while also de-weaponizing as much of government as absolutely possible," he noted in a written statement.
'A second Trump presidency should seek to return power and control to the people.'
"To that end, any GOP controlled-chamber of Congress should look to realize that vision at the statute level, unlike what it couldn't do in Trump's first term. Thus, virtually all the good things Trump did, aside from the tax cuts, were unilateral actions that Biden was able to roll back in about 15 minutes," he wrote.
"Autonomy is in the Constitution: 'No person should be denied life, liberty, or property without due process of law.' We have to defend life starting with the unborn, which Trump did a fine job of as president but has disappointed in his rhetoric as a candidate. That should extend to persecuted, non-violent January 6 prisoners, as well as other believers currently being targeted by DOJ for daring to pray at baby-killing clinics. The American citizens should see their autonomy defended with a secure border. Energy independence also confirms our collective autonomy. The Democrats seek power and control. A second Trump presidency should seek to return power and control to the people," Deace wrote.
On the question of how Trump could unilaterally use his authority as president to secure major conservative wins and cut down on the out-of-control size of the federal government, West told Blaze News, "I am not a fan of massive executive orders. I prefer regular-order legislative process. However, the issue of illegal immigration adversely affects our economy, our national and domestic security, our education system, our health care system, and advances drug trafficking. If there are two areas where Trump must act unilaterally, it is as Joe Biden did, on the issue of our energy security and illegal immigation."
"If Republicans find themselves in control of both Houses, then develop a Newt Gingrich-style 'Contract with America', not some 150-page document as Kevin McCarthy created, but 10 simple policy solutions that they will enact in the first 100 days ... and freaking do it!" West said.
"If Republicans find themselves in control of only one of the bicameral legislative bodies, hopefully it is the House of Representatives, then restore regular order. Stop the circular firing squad antics, and pass the legislation that relates to the president's restoration of constitutional governance agenda. It is time to do as Ronald Reagan admonished, paint in bold colors, no more pretty pastels. The time for excuses has ended," he declared.
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