**Trump Suggests Third Term, Despite Constitutional Limits**  

 WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Former President Donald Trump reiterated Sunday that he is "not joking" about seeking a third term, signaling his most direct challenge yet to the constitutional restriction barring presidents from serving more than two terms.  

 Trump told NBC News in a phone interview, "There are methods which you could do it," but later said it was "far too early to think about it." Franklin D. Roosevelt's ratification of the 22nd Amendment in 1951 "No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice," says Roosevelt's four-term presidency. Trump acknowledged, "Well, that's one," when NBC's Kristen Welker asked if one possible strategy involved Vice President JD Vance running and then handing power back to him. But there are others too.  There are others."  Pressed for another example, he declined to elaborate.  

 Legal experts have pushed back on the feasibility of Trump circumventing the two-term limit.  Derek Muller, an election law professor at Notre Dame, pointed to the 12th Amendment, which states that anyone ineligible for the presidency is also ineligible to serve as vice president.  "I don't think there's any 'one weird trick' to getting around presidential term limits," Muller said.  

 A third-term bid would also require widespread political and legal backing, including approval from federal and state officials, courts, and voters.  Muller suggested Trump's remarks were politically motivated.  "A lame-duck president like Donald Trump has every incentive to appear as strong as possible," he said.

  

 Asked whether he would want to continue serving beyond a second term, Trump, who would be 82 at that time, responded, "Well, I like working."  He also argued that Americans would support an extended presidency due to his popularity, falsely claiming he has "the highest poll numbers of any Republican for the last 100 years."  

 Historical data contradicts this claim—Gallup polls show that President George W.  Bush reached a 90% approval rating after 9/11, and George H.W.  Bush reached 89% following the Gulf War. Trump, by contrast, peaked at 47% during his second term.  Despite this, he insisted he was "in the high 70s in many polls, in the real polls."  

 Trump has previously floated the idea of serving beyond two terms, often in a joking manner.  In January, he quipped at a House Republican retreat, "Am I allowed to run again?"  

 Representatives for congressional leaders—including House Speaker Mike Johnson, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, and their Democratic counterparts, Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer—did not immediately respond to requests for comment.