President Donald Trump could not run for a third term, but he could be president a third time, according to Cornell law professor Bill Jacobson.   The 22nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is clear that no one can be elected to the office of the president “more than twice.”   “But there’s nothing in the Constitution that prohibits someone from serving a third term,” said Jacobson, founder and publisher of Legal Insurrection. If another candidate won the presidential election, and Trump was his or her vice presidential running mate, that candidate could step aside after winning the race and allow Trump to take over, according to Jacobson, who was quick to add he doesn’t endorse such an action.   While a deal made with a running mate for Trump to serve a third term “does not violate the Constitution,” Jacobson says, it “might violate the spirit of the Constitution.”   The intent of the 22nd Amendment is “that we not have a permanent president,” Jacobson said, adding that because of that, serving a third term “might be subject to challenge,” adding: It might be subject to what was the original meaning of these terms. But on its face, there’s no barrier.   The conversation of Trump serving a third term recently landed in headlines when a number of reporters started asking the president if he wanted a third term.   “I’m not looking at that, but I’ll tell you, I have had more people asking me to have a third term,” Trump said while speaking with reporters on Air Force One at the end of March.   This isn’t the first time the idea of a former two-term president serving another term has been floated. In October 2023, Howard J. Klein of Lakewood Ranch, Florida, wrote in a letter to the editor of The Wall Street Journal that former President Barack Obama could run as the vice presidential candidate with then-President Joe Biden.   “Mr. Obama would constitutionally succeed to the presidency—without election—if Mr. Biden were to vacate the office,” Klein wrote.   The 22nd Amendment was added to the Constitution in 1951 in the wake of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s election to four terms in 1932, 1936, 1940, and 1944. Congress approved the 22nd Amendment on March 21, 1947, then submitted it to the state legislatures for required ratification. The ratification process was completed on Feb. 27, 1951, when the required 36 of the then-48 states (before Hawaii and Alaska joined the union) had ratified the amendment. Jacobson sits down with The Daily Signal to provide his legal opinion on Trump serving a third term and to discuss the work of the Equal Protection Project, a project of the Legal Insurrection Foundation aimed at holding universities accountable for violating the Constitution’s equal-protection guarantees.   Watch the conversation above.   The post Could Trump Get a Third Term? Law Professor Explains appeared first on The Daily Signal.

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—The number of migrant children arriving alone at the southern border reached an all-time low in March.   Border Patrol encountered 631 unaccompanied alien children at the southwest border last month, down 97% from the record high of 18,716 under the administration of then-President Joe Biden in March 2021, according to a senior Department of Homeland Security official.   “March was the lowest number of unaccompanied children arriving at our southern border in recorded history,” Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, told The Daily Signal.   President Donald Trump and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem “are stopping the exploitation and trafficking of children,” McLaughlin said. “Thanks to strong leadership, we now have the most secure border in American history.”   On average, 11,132 unaccompanied children were encountered at the southern border monthly under the Biden administration, according to the DHS official. So far under the Trump administration, the monthly average is below 700.   Encounters of illegal aliens at the southern border have seen a steady decline since Trump returned to office, with total Border Patrol encounters between ports of entry reaching a historic low in March. “Border Patrol encounters for the month of March were 7,181 total,” Noem wrote on X on Tuesday, adding, “Compare that to the ~160,000 average monthly encounters under Joe Biden.” Under President @realdonaldtrump, our borders are more secure than ever in American history.Border Patrol encounters for the month of March were 7,181 total. Compare that to the ~160,000 average monthly encounters under Joe Biden.Thank you to the patriotic @CBP men and women… pic.twitter.com/rwVKQiVsNK— Secretary Kristi Noem (@Sec_Noem) April 2, 2025 Following extensive reporting and a number of congressional hearings on missing migrant children during the Biden administration, DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffari conducted an audit “to determine [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s] ability to monitor the location and status of [unaccompanied alien children] once released or transferred from DHS and HHS’ custody.”   In a report released in March, the Inspector General’s Office found that the location of thousands of illegal alien children remains unknown, and ICE cannot monitor the status of those children after they are released from government custody.    From the start of fiscal year 2019 to 2023, “ICE transferred more than 448,000 [unaccompanied alien children] to HHS,” according to the report. Most of those minors were then transferred to sponsors, but “more than 31,000 of the 448,000 children’s release addresses were blank, undeliverable, or missing apartment numbers.”    Children have long been some of the greatest victims of cartel smuggling schemes at the U.S. southern border with Mexico.  In 2008, Congress voted to pass the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act. The bipartisan piece of legislation contained a glaring loophole that the criminal cartels have exploited.    Under the bill, unaccompanied migrant children from noncontiguous nations (i.e., any countries other than Mexico and Canada) are to be screened to determine if they are trafficking victims and then released into the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement, which in turn releases the child to a sponsor in the U.S., making it much harder to find a child if they do not appear for their asylum hearing.     A sponsor can be a distant relative the child has never met, or not related at all. Because the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection law allows for the release of unaccompanied minors into the U.S. who are not from Mexico or Canada, the cartels were given the opportunity to entice minors to cross the border, knowing they would not be turned away.   According to the Office of Refugee Resettlement, 81% of unaccompanied alien children are between the ages of 13 and 18. The average age of a trafficking victim in the U.S. is between 12 and 15, according to Anti-Trafficking International.     The Flores Settlement Agreement is another policy border security experts have warned is being exploited to the benefit of the cartels.   The Flores Settlement Agreement was first implemented in the 1990s and prohibits the detention of a minor for more than 20 days. Because processing an illegal alien often takes longer than 20 days, and seeing an immigration court judge takes even longer, the unaccompanied minors are often released rapidly, again creating more incentive for the cartels to exploit minors.   The post EXCLUSIVE: Number of Unaccompanied Alien Children Arriving at Border Hits Record Low Under Trump appeared first on The Daily Signal.

President Donald Trump threw his support to the Senate’s budget plan Wednesday, as he called on Republicans to unify and pass a bill that would ensure that his 2017 tax cuts are extended and funding is provided for border security and other campaign promises. “Speaker of the House Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune have been working tirelessly on taking the next step to pass the plan for our ONE, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL,” said Trump on Truth Social on Wednesday, adding: “The Senate Plan has my Complete and Total Support. Likewise, the House is working along the same lines. Every Republican, House and Senate, must UNIFY. We need to pass it IMMEDIATELY!” Speaker of the House Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune have been working tirelessly on taking the next step to pass the plan for our ONE, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL, as it is known, as well as getting us closer to the Debt Extension necessary to continue our great work.…— Donald J. Trump Posts From His Truth Social (@TrumpDailyPosts) April 2, 2025 Trump’s call for unity came days before the Senate’s expected “vote-a-rama,” which will likely fall on Friday and possibly carry over into Saturday, in which senators have the right to debate the resolution and propose amendments before voting. In a statement to The Daily Signal, Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., echoed the president’s calls for rapid action on passing the budget plan. Marshall contended that the package provides the tools for “making the Trump tax cuts permanent, reducing wasteful spending, unleashing American energy, and securing our border.” The budget resolution is the first step in the budgetary process, in which Congress sets ceilings and floors for spending in different policy areas. Those ceilings and floors are further fleshed out and codified in law by the budget reconciliation process. Republicans believe that Americans who earn their money know the best way to spend their money.No matter how many times Democrats try to distort or distract, we are determined to make tax relief permanent for working families. pic.twitter.com/smEQJBGwwf— Leader John Thune (@LeaderJohnThune) April 3, 2025 In February, Trump praised the House of Representatives’ budget resolution, which was passed independently of the Senate. Both houses must approve the resolution by a simple majority. After weeks of meetings between Johnson and Thune, the Senate released a compromise budget plan to pass through both chambers. Now, facing what’s being called a “vote-a-rama,” senior Republican senators are touting Trump’s endorsement of the Senate plan as motivation for their colleagues to swiftly pass the resolution, which must also be approved by the House. We MUST pass the Trump-endorsed Senate budget framework to secure tax cuts, border security, and DOGE cuts.This is step one. We’re in 24/7 communication with @WhiteHouse.Hope nobody made weekend plans. pic.twitter.com/7yd5jZHLaH— Markwayne Mullin (@SenMullin) April 3, 2025 In a statement to The Daily Signal, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who chairs the Senate Budget Committee, said that “Trump supports the Senate’s budget plan because the Senate is rallying around President Trump’s priorities.” As chairman, Graham has played a central role in shaping the Senate’s budget plan. He added, “President Trump supports major spending reductions, making the tax cuts permanent, securing the border, and helping the military. The Senate budget blueprint does all that and more.” Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, said that “Senate Republicans are united behind Trump’s agenda and that “cuts to fraudulent and wasteful spending, making the Trump tax reform permanent, and massive regulatory relief” are key features of the resolution. The post Trump Backs Senate’s Budget Plan: ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ appeared first on The Daily Signal.

President Donald Trump has endorsed the bill that Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., left the House Freedom Caucus over, which would allow proxy voting for members of Congress who are new parents. “I don’t know why it’s controversial,” the president told reporters on Air Force One on Thursday. Luna left the conservative Freedom Caucus over other members’ opposition to the bill she co-sponsored with Rep. Brittany Pettersen, D-Colo., that would allow moms and dads in Congress to vote by proxy for 12 weeks after the birth of a baby. Trump said he spoke to Luna on Wednesday about the bill. “I’m going to let the speaker make the decision, but I like the idea of being able to, if you’re having a baby, I think you should be able to call in and vote,” the president said. “I’m in favor of that, but I understand some people aren’t involved in the issue, but I did, I spoke to Anna yesterday. She and some people feel strongly about it, and I would agree with them.” Trump supports @realannapaulina’s push to allow proxy voting for new parents:“I don’t know why it’s controversial.”“I’m gonna let the Speaker make the decision … if you're having a baby, I think you should be able to call in and vote. I’m in favor of that.” pic.twitter.com/FRhRDXWZ4s— Kit Maher (@KitMaherCNN) April 3, 2025 Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., declined to put the bill on the floor Tuesday, but Luna joined with more than 200 Democrats and nine other Republicans to use a discharge petition to circumvent leadership and force a vote. That temporarily blocks Republicans from bringing up other House business, forcing Johnson to cancel votes for the rest of the week.  Johnson thinks allowing proxy voting “would do great violence to the institution to reopen Pandora’s box,” he said before the vote, contending that proxy voting is unconstitutional and a slippery slope. “If you allow it for some situations, you’re ultimately going to have to allow it for all,” Johnson said. “And I think that destroys the deliberative nature of the body.” Press secretary Karoline Leavitt told The Daily Signal at Tuesday’s press conference that she had not spoken to the president about his thoughts on the proxy voting bill. .@DailySignal’s @TheElizMitchell: “Representative Anna Paulina — Anna Paulina Luna left the Freedom Caucus over their lack of support over their lack of support for her bill that would allow new parents to proxy vote around 12 weeks around the birth of their baby. Does the… pic.twitter.com/Sb4QZQJBPh— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) April 1, 2025 Some conservatives say parents like Luna and Pettersen should be willing to sacrifice their careers in Congress for their families. “If you are unable to fulfill the duties required of a member of Congress because you are a parent of a small child, feel free to resign. Many have before,” Evita Duffy-Alfonso, daughter of Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy, wrote on X. Duffy-Alfonso cited her father stepping down from Congress after her younger sister was born with Down syndrome and two holes in her heart. When my baby sister was born with two holes in her heart and needed a very risky surgery, my father, @SecDuffy, knew he needed be at home with his newborn daughter, my mother, and my eight siblings. So my dad resigned. What he did not do was demand an unconstitutional exception… pic.twitter.com/TFtLKFWeYq— Evita Duffy-Alfonso (@evitaduffy_1) April 2, 2025 “Proxy voting is unconstitutional and will be abused and expanded,” Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, wrote on X. “Show up for work, or don’t run for Congress.” The Constitution doesn’t allow proxy voting https://t.co/Ltjd8MLXAj— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) April 2, 2025 The post Trump Backs Luna’s Bill to Allow New Parents in Congress to Vote by Proxy appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The Trump administration’s Health and Human Services Department has canceled hundreds of millions of dollars in grants dedicated to researching illegal sexual behavior in children, pregnancy prevention for “transgender boys,” and so-called sleep inequality affecting black sexual-minority men.   In March, HHS canceled at least $530 million of funding for LGBTQ health research programs, according to a grant tracker from Noam Ross of rOpenSci and Scott Delaney of Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health. HHS previously provided more than $990 million of grant funding to LGBTQ health research programs, according to the tracker.  The National Institutes of Health’s newly sworn-in director, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, said that under his tutelage, the agency would shift its priorities toward “research aimed at preventing, treating, and curing chronic conditions like cancer, diabetes, heart disease, obesity and many others that cause so much suffering and deaths among all Americans, LGBTQ individuals included.”  The shift “away from politicized DEI and gender ideology studies” is in “accordance with the president’s executive orders,” HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon told The Daily Signal. The priority shift included cutting funding for studies focused on radical gender ideology, critical race theory, and other topics that polls show to be wildly unpopular with Americans, according to The Daily Signal’s review of terminated grants. For instance, the Trump administration cut off $10,000 of promised funding to a conference Feb. 25-27 at the University of Oklahoma called “Be Curious Not Judgmental: The 4th National Symposium on Sexual Behavior of Youth.”  “Professionals and parents continue to use myths and misunderstandings as the base of decisions on problematic and illegal sexual behavior of children and adolescents,” the symposium’s website reads. “Adults worry about addressing sexual topics, and yet youth continue to be inundated with graphic sexual images and messages.” “We need to better equip professionals and parents to understand and support healthy sexual development and to identify problematic sexual behavior early and intervene with all children and caregivers impacted,” the description continues.  One breakout session at the conference focused on “The Help-Wanted Prevention Intervention for Minor Attracted Individuals,” a euphemism for pedophiles.   On March 21, Trump’s NIH terminated a $2.9 million grant to the University of Minnesota for research on “adolescent health at the intersections of sexual, gender, racial/ethnic, immigrant identities and native language.”  The study aimed to determine “what positive and negative experiences are particularly relevant to the overlapping, simultaneous production of inequalities by [sexual and gender minority] identity, race/ethnicity, immigration experiences, and native language?” The pre-Trump NIH promised the Research Triangle Institute $100,507 to study “social influences on sexual health among Latinx adolescents and emerging adults who identify as LGBTQ+ in an agricultural community.”  NIH ended a $1.5 million grant to Urban Health Partnerships for “leveraging a community-driven approach to address the impact of social determinants of health on structural inequities among Miami-Dade County’s intergenerational LGBTQ+ Community.”  Hunter College lost its $211,100 grant to study “development and feasibility of a psychosocial intervention for sexual and gender minority autistic adults.” On March 18, NIH cut off Virginia Commonwealth University’s $205,308 grant focused on “using youth-engaged methods to develop and evaluate a measure for disordered eating behaviors in transgender and gender-diverse youth.”  “Transgender, nonbinary, and gender-diverse (TNG) youth face stigma due to the marginalization of their gender identities,” the study says. “TNG youth also have increased vulnerability to body dissatisfaction due to pubertal changes and development of secondary sexual characteristics that might be misaligned with their gender identity, which may be exacerbated by a youth’s inability to access gender-affirming medical care (i.e., puberty blockers, gender-affirming hormones).” Yale University lost government funding for a program, “Training in Behavioral Design Interventions to Address Stigma Among Men Who have Sex with Men.”  “This study will explore relationships of different discrimination experiences and sexual health among young Black men who have sex with men (YBMSM),” the project narrative says. “This study aims to better the sexual health of YBMSM throughout their lives by informing future interventions that help decrease new cases of HIV and other poor sexual health outcomes.”  The NIH terminated its $2,368,492 contract with Brown University to study “improving mental health among the LGBTQ+ community impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.” NIH had committed more than $1.3 million to Princeton University to study “Views of Gender in Adolescence.” “Gender diverse children often experience disparities in mental health and well-being,” the project narrative says. “Further questions concern the stability of their gender, as that has implications for medical transitions. The proposed work would examine the role of gender beliefs and self-categorization in predicting mental health and well-being, as well as provide better estimates of rates of stability and change across time in the identities of both cisgender and gender-diverse youth.”  Trump’s HHS terminated a $1.3 million grant to the Center for Innovative Public Health Research to study “Adapting an LGB+ inclusive teen-pregnancy prevention program for transgender boys.”  The project’s goal was to change the title of “Girl2Girl,” a text messaging-based teen prevention pregnancy program, to “#TranscendentHealth, a gender-inclusive [teen prevention pregnancy program] for transgender boys.”  Other grants funded by the NIH before Trump took over included $2.5 million to a study on “Efficacy of a Multi-level School Intervention for LGBTQ Youth”; $6.4 million to “Multilevel strategies to understand and modify the role of structural and environmental context on HIV inequities for sexual and gender minorities of color”; and $1.8 million to “Sexual minority couples’ health during the transition to marriage.”  NIH canceled a grant of $1.3 million to examine “the Mechanisms and Consequences of Sleep Health Inequities Affecting Black Sexual Minority Men.” “Using a syndemic and multilevel approach, this project seeks to investigate relationships between sleep and HIV treatment outcomes and behaviors (e.g., viral suppression and retention in care) among Black gay, bisexual and other sexual minority men (SMM),” the project narrative says, “a population in the United States heavily impacted by HIV/AIDS.”  The National Institutes of Health “remains fully committed to supporting research aimed at improving the health and well-being of every American, regardless of their sexual identity,” HHS spokesman Nixon said.  The post We Were Paying for What? Trump HHS Slashes Hundreds of Millions in Woke LGBTQ Grants appeared first on The Daily Signal.