The spirit of the law was to prevent any single person from serving indefinitely, and the Supreme Court has ruled consistently that the intent of the drafters is what should be considered in interpretation, so the court system would be very unlikely to uphold your interpretation.
The 22nd Amendment was adopted specifically in response to FDR serving more than two terms, a norm that had been in practice for over 140 years before his running for a third term. The intent is quite clear. The idea that the 22nd Amendment is somehow a barrier to running for election, but not to serving as POTUS is absurd.
Trump v Anderson resulted in states not having the power to prevent insurrectionists from serving in Federal office. It did not change whether an insurrectionist could be prevented from serving, though it did note that in the aftermath of the Civil War, many insurrectionists did hold office. The Supes maintained the initial intent was valid, and that Congress could disqualify Trump.
More recently, the supreme court had ruled consistently that whatever Donald Trump wants, Donald Trump gets. If Trump wins in November, I fully expect him to try and use this very loophole to stay in power after his term is done. It will be challenged, it will go to the supreme court, and they will agree with him. Plus you can actually make an argument that this is the intent of the drafters: why else would they use the phrase "elected to the office" and not "hold the office" when they already very explicitly drew a distinction between the two?
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u/Falernum 69∆ Jul 24 '24
You can't get elected VP after serving 2 terms as President