NATIONAL HARBOR, MD — It’s not easy being king. Just ask President Donald Trump.
Trump has persistently teased a third term for years now.
“Should I run again?” Trump asked at a Black History Month event at the White House earlier today. “You tell me?”
“Four more years!” the guests chanted. “Four more years!”
While his handpicked White House audience erupted in applause, there doesn't seem to be a groundswell of support for the idea amongst the president’s most ardent, far-right supporters. At least not at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference, better known as CPAC.
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But that hasn't prevented efforts from some on the right to turn the president’s quips into Constitutional-altering reality. The effort is real, even if enthusiasm isn’t — yet.
A new advocacy group, the Third Term Project — which has adopted a Caesar-like Trump image as its logo — is dedicated to upending the 22nd Amendment so that Trump can serve a third term.
“We believe that, you know, Trump is the Caesar figure that America has needed. You know, Trump is a Napoleonic figure that has emerged to lead our country,” the Third Term Project’s Shane Trejo told reporters earlier. “Some leftists might, you know, get triggered, they might get angry at stuff like this, but we think that's part of the problem. So we're playing into that.”
It remains unclear if they’re playing, though.
On the CPAC mainstage Thursday, former Trump chief strategist Steve Bannon wasn’t playing when he implored the audience to rally around the twice-impeached president.
“The future of MAGA is Donald Trump!” Bannon told attendees to cheers. “We want Trump in ’28. That’s what they can’t stand. A man like Trump comes along only once or twice in the country’s history. We want Trump!”
Applause aside, a possible third Trump term effort felt limp.
Last week — on Valentine's Day, nonetheless — a small band of conservatives announced the new Third Term Project, whose goal is to MAGA-fy the Constitution through precise tweaks that would allow Trump to serve a third presidential term — and excluding former Presidents Barrack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, who already served two consecutive terms.
The effort piggybacks on a resolution Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) dropped on Jan. 23rd — before Trump’s Department of Justice withdrew its criminal investigation into the congressman the following week — calling for amending the 22nd Amendment so that presidents would be allowed to serve three non-consecutive terms.
“Right now, no other co-sponsors have come to support the measure, so we want to get more Republicans on the record in support of this,” Trejo said.
Supportive Republicans were, seemingly, nowhere to be found.
The Washington region leans liberal, but CPAC is firmly Trump country.
That seems why, instead of using one of the countless empty rooms at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center, this new group held their inaugural press conference in the resort’s central, expansive, and popular public lobby.
Instead of a celebration, the event seemed to barely raise curiosity.
CPAC press events often attract a steady stream of dozens of lanyard-adorned onlookers who take joy in watching the "fake news" media in their unnatural, CPAC-soaked environment.
But there was barely even a spectacle to spectate. Initially, a mere four reporters — at least four folks with recording gear — showed up.
Even group leaders appeared underwhelmed by the few reporters who came out, which ballooned to some eight or so by the press conference’s end.
“Okay, do we have any further questions?” Trejo asked.
“Do you think there’s anybody that you can really target to get on board with this?” a reporter asked.
“Not at the present time,” Trejo replied. “Right now, we're just focusing on making sure that conservative Republicans sign on to represent the Ogles amendment. Right now, a lot of them have been silent. We want to make sure that this is a top priority for them to get on board. So we're going to work on going to work on solidifying the core there, and then moving on to perhaps less conservative Republicans and Democrats.”
Contrary to their Caesar-Trump logo, the founders of the Third Term Project say they're all about strengthening democracy.
“It's not guaranteeing a third term for President Trump,” said Mark Ivanyo, the group’s less talkative co-founder who moonlights as the executive director of Republicans for National Renewal. “It's guaranteeing an opportunity for him to run, so the people could for sure say, ‘Well, we don't want Trump anymore, we're tired of his policies. We're gonna elect someone else.’”
Raw Story inquired about the MAGA mission.
“Is the goal still draining the swamp?” Raw Story pressed. “Or, some might argue, this is y'all becoming the swamp and taking it over?”
“What you're seeing, what he's doing, he is draining the swamp,” Trejo told Raw Story. “And if he has four more years, there'll be four more years that he's enacting those same policies to drain the swamp.”